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BELASCO   THEATRE 

BROADWAY     AND      FORTY-SEC  OND      STREET1 

UNDER   THE   SOLE   MANAGEMENT   or   DAVID   BELASCO 

Evenings  at  8  precisely  Matinees  Saturdays  at  2 

DAVID    BELASCO 

PRESENTS 

Leslie  Carter 

IX    HIS    NEW    PLAT 

«DU  BARRY" 

"Not  the  great  historical  events, but  the  personal  incidents  that  call 
up  single,  sharp  pictures  of  some  human  being  in  its  pang  or  strug- 
gle, reach  us  more  nearly."  — OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES. 

CAST 

Louis  XV.,  King  of  France  .  .  ,  .  .  C.A.STEVENSON 
COMTE  JEAN  DU  BARRY,  eventually  brother-in-law  of 

"  La  du  Barry  " CAMPBELL  GOLLAN 

COMTE  GUILLAUME,  his  brother  ....  BERESFORD  WEBB 
Dec  DE  BRISSAC,  Capt.  of  King's  Guard,  HENRY  WEAVER,  SR. 
CossE-BnissAC,  his  son  (of  the  King's  Guard),  known 

as  "  Cosse  " HAMILTON  REVEILE 

THE  PAPAL  NUNCIO H.  R.  ROBERTS 

Due  DE  RICHELIEU,  Marshal  ^  ( 

of  France I  Under  I  GEO.  BAR.NUM 

MAUPEOU,  Lord  Chancellor  j  Louis  XV.  |  C.  P.  FLOCKTON 
TERRAY,  Minister  of  Finance  }  \  H.  G.  CARLTON 

Due  D'AiouiLLON LEONARD  COOPER 

DENYS,  porter  at  the  milliner  shop  .  CLAUDE  GILLINGWATER 
LEBEL,  confidential  valet  to  His  Majesty,  HERBERT  MILLWARD 
M.  LABILLE,  proprietor  of  the  milliner  shop,  GILMOHE  SCOTT 
VAUBERNIER,  father  of  Jeanette  .  .  CHARLES  CAMPBELL 
SCARLO,  one  of  "  La  du  Barry's"  Nubian  servants,  J.  D.  JONES 
ZAMORE,  a  plaything  of  "  La  du  Barry's  "  .  MASTER  SAMS 

FLUTE  PLAYER  . A.  JOLY 

1 


DU    BARRY"  — CAST    CONTINUED 


VALROY  .... 
D'ALTAIRE  „     .     . 
DE  COURCEL     .     . 
LA  GARDE   . 
FONTENELLE 
BEXARD,  one  of  the 


DOUGLAS  J.  WOOD 
.  .  Louis  MYLL 
.  HAROLD  HOWARD 
.  .  W.  T.  BUNE 
THOMAS  BOOXE 
.  WARREN  DEVEN 


1        Of  the       ( 
/King's  Guards 

Two  Tavern 
Roysterers 

Hundred  Swiss  " 
CITIZEN  GRIEVE,  of  the  Committee  of  Public 

Safety GASTON  MERVALE 

MARAC,  one  of  the  Sans-Culottes     .     .     .     JAMES  SARGEANT 
DENISOT,  Judge  of  the  Revolutionary  Court,  H.  G.  CARLTON 

TA VERNIER,  clerk  of  the  court JOHN  INGRAM 

GOMAHD CHARLES  HAYNE 

HORTENSE,  Manageress  for  Labille  the 


LOLOTTE          .... 

[  NINA  LYN 

MANON    

/""ii-lc. 

FLORENCE  ST   LEONARD 

JULIE      

at  the 

CORAH  ADAMS 

LEONIE   

Milliner's" 

.    BLANCHE  SHERWOOD 

NlCHETTE      .... 

JULIETTE 

Shop 

.     .     .     .      ANN  ARCHER 
.  MAY  LYN 

MARQUISE  DU  QUESNOY,  known  as  "La  Gourdan," 

keeper  of  a  gambling  house BLANCHE  RICE 

SOPHIE  ARNAULD,  queen  of  the  opera  .  .  Miss  ROBERTSON 
THE  GYPSY  HAG,  a  fortune-teller  ...  C.  P.  FLOCKTON 
MLLE.  LE  GRAND  )  Dancers  from  the  (  •  •  RUTH  DENNIS 
MLLE.  GUIMAHD  .  \  Grand  Opera  (  .  ELEANOR  STL-ART 
MME.  LA  DAUPHINE,  Marie  Antoinette  at 

sixteen  HELEN  HALE 


MARQUISE  DE  CRENAY 
DUCHESSE  D'AlGUILLON 
PRINCESSE  ALIXE  .     . 
DUCHESSE  DE  CHOISY 
MARQUISE  DE  LANGERS 

CoMTESSE  DE  MARSEN 


Ladies 

of 

Louis' 
Court 


.  HELEN  ROBERTSON 
,     .     .     .       Miss  LYN 
.    Miss  LEONARD 
,     .    LOUISE  MOREWIN 
.     .      MAY  MONTFORD 
GRACE  VAN  BENTHUYSEN 

SOPHIE,  a  maid IRMA  PERRY 

ROSALIE,  of  the  Conciergerie  .     .     .     :     .  HELEN  ROBERTSON 

CERISETTE JULIE  LINDSEY 

AND 
JEANETTE  VAUBERNIER,  afterwards 

"La  du  Barry"     .     .          .     .  MRS.  LESLIE  CARTER 

2 


"DU    BARRY"  —  CAST    CONTINUED 

Guests  of  the  Fete,  Dancers  from  the  Opera,  King's 
Guardsmen,  Monks,  Clowns,  Pages,  Milliners,  Sentries, 
Lackeys,  Footmen,  King's  Secret  Police,  Sans-Culottes,  a 
Mock  King,  a  Mock  Herald,  a  Drunken  Patriot,  a  Cocoa 
Vender,  Federals,  National  Guards,  Tricoteuses. 

SYNOPSIS  OF  SCENES. 

Act      I.  —  The  Milliner's  Shop  in  the  Rue  St.  Honore,  Paris. 
JEANETTE  TRIMS  HATS. 

Act    II.— (One  month  later.)  Jeanette's  Apartments,  adjoin- 
ing the  Gambling  Rooms  of  the  Marquise  de 
Quesnoy  ("  La  Gourdan  "). 
"THE  GAME  CALLED  DESTINY." 

Act  III.  — (A  year  later.)     Du  Barry  holds  a  Petit-Lever  in 
the  Palace  of  Versailles  —  at  noon. 
"THE  DOLL  OF  THE  WORLD." 

Act  IV.  —  Scene  1.     In  the   Royal   Gardens.     Before  the 

dawn  of  the  following  morning. 

"FOLLY,  QUEEN  OF  FRANCE." 

Scene  2.     Within  the  Tent. 

"THE  HEART  OF  THE  WOMAN." 
Act    V.  — (A  lapse  of  years.)     During  the  Revolution. 

Scene  1.     The  Retreat  in  the  Woods  of  Louve- 

ciennes. 

"FATE  CREEPS  IN  AT  THE  DOOR." 

Scene  2.     (Five  days  later.)     In  Paris  again. 
"A  REED  SHAKEN  IN  THE  WIND." 

Scene  3.     In  Front  of  the  Milliner's  Shop  on  the 
same  day. 

"  Once  more  we  pass  this  way  again, 
Once  morel  T  is  where  at  first  we  met." 

Time :   Period  of  Louis   XV   and   after  the   reign  of  his 
Successor. 

Place  :  Paris,  Versailles,  and  Louveciennes. 

.  Mr.  Belasco  wishes  to  state  that,  as  the  traditional  parting 
of  Madame  du  Barry  and  the  King  of  France  is  impossible 
for  dramatic  use,  he  has  departed  entirely  from  historical 
accuracy  in  this  instance.  He  also  begs  to  acknowledge  his 
indebtedness  to  M.  Arsene  Houssaye  for  his  sequence  of 
scenes.  ("  Nouvelle  a  la  main,  sur  la  Comtesse  du  Barry.") 
3 


"D  U    BARRY"  — CAST    CONTINUED 

Between  Acts  I,  II,  and  III  there  will  be  intervals  of  12 
minutes  ;  between  Acts  IV  and  V  an  interval  of  15  minutes. 

The  entire  production  under  the  personal  supervision  of 
Mr.  Belasco. 

Stage  Manager H.  S.  MLLLWARD 

Scenery  by  Mr.  Ernest  Gros. 
Incidental  Music  by  Mr.  William  Furst. 

Stage  decorations  and  accessories  after  designs   by  Mr. 
Wilfred  Buckland. 

General  Manager  for  Mr.  Belasco     .     .     MR.  B.  F.  ROEDER 


BEFORE  THE  CURTAIN 

~DRIEF  words,  when  actions  wait,  are  well; 

The  prompters  hand  is  on  his  bell ; 
The  coming  heroes,  lovers,  kings, 
Are  idly  lounging  at  the  wings  ; 
Behind  the  curtains  mystic  fold 
The  glowing  future  lies  unrolled. 


One  moment  more :  if  here  we  raise 
The  oft-sung  hymn  of  local  praise, 
Before  the  curtain  facts  must  sway  ; 
Here  wails  the  moral  of  your  play. 
Glassed  in  the  poet's  thought,  you  view 
What  money  can,  yet  can  not  do  ; 
The  faith  that  soars,  the  deeds  that  shine, 
Above  the  gold  that  builds  the  shrine. 

—  BRET  HARTE 


Copyright  by 

HOUGHTON,  MlFPLIN   &   Co. 


TO-NIGHT 


H  E  author  of  to-night's 
play  finds  himself  in  the 
position  of  one  who  has 
journeyed  far  and  along  a 
difficult  way,  but  is  home 
at  last. 

To  his  home — and  Mrs. 
Carter's — he  welcomes  you, 
wishing  it  to  prove,  so  far  as  comfort  and  appoint- 
ment can  make  it,  an  annex  of  your  own. 

A  dedication  is  an  outline  of  purpose,  just  as  a 
christening  is  an  act  of  faith.  A  word,  therefore, 
as  to  the  plans  of  this  house.  The  Belasco  Theatre 
will  be  devoted  to  such  plays  as  prove  suitable  to 
the  art  and  temperament  of  Mrs.  Leslie  Carter, 
who,  by  her  tireless  devotion  to  her'  work,  her 
capacity  for  reaching  the  heart,  and  her  flashes  of 
insight  into  human  nature  as  it  is,  has  achieved 
a  unique  place  upon  the  English-speaking  stage 
of  to-day.  Here  she  will  appear  during  a  part 
of  every  season.  Her  plays  will  not  be  confined 
to  those  of  any  one  author.  It  is  the  present 


10  TO-NIGHT 

purpose  to  have  Mrs.  Carter  seen  in  Shakesperean 
and  classic  roles,  of  which  she  has  been  making  a 
close  study. 

Mrs.  Carter  will  share  this  season  with  her 
sister  artist,  Miss  Blanche  Bates,  who  will  follow 
the  "  Du  Barry "  in  a  new  play  now  in  course  of 
preparation.  Miss  Bates  has  proved  herself 
worthy  of  a  stronger  drama  than  any  in  which 
she  has  yet  appeared,  and  her  forthcoming  role  is 
one  which  will  offer  her  the  opportunity  of  her 
career. 

Later,  Mr.  David  Warfield,  who  has  been  called 
the  "  comedian  of  pathos,"  will  appear  from  time 
to  time. 

Next  season  Mrs.  Carter  will  open  here  in  her 
new  and  unnamed  play,  which  will  appeal  partic- 
ularly to  her  genius  for  sustained  tragedy  of 
intense,  quiet  suspense  and  depth  of  feeling. 
Eventually  it  is  probable  that  a  stock  company 
may  gather  in  under  the  roof-tree. 

A  word  as  to  the  decorations  in  the  interior  of 
the  theatre.  On  your  chair  you  will  see  the 
Napoleonic  bee ;  this  Mr.  Belasco  has  chosen  for 
the  house  emblem  because  it  means  "  work,  work, 
work  ! "  The  Napoleonic  era  has  also  been  ad- 
hered to  in  other  decorations,  chiefly  because 
this  period  was  the  luxurious  cradle  of  romantic 
literature. 

The  genius  of  drama  was  born  among  the 
ancient  Greeks,  and  the  best  there  is  in  our 
theatres  can  trace  its  source  to  them.  They 
were  the  first  to  find  outward  expression  for  in- 
ward grace.  To  them  beauty  was  a  thing  more 


INTERIOR 


Bigehw,  (falli!  and  Cotton,  jtrchittcti 


TO-NIGHT  13 

of  spirit  than  human,  and  they  created  an  art  for 
the  world  that  was  severely  classic  in  its  exquisite 
balance  of  form  and  feeling.  Not  until  Napoleon 
stirred  the  bitterness  of  men's  souls  by  the  violence 
of  war,  did  the  warmth  of  luxury  such  as  Greek 
philosophers  had  evaded  in  their  expression  of 
feeling  appear  in  art. 

To-day  the  imperial  wreath  that  crowns  the 
proscenium  arch  is  a  symbol  of  the  drama.  The 
ornamental  decorations  of  the  Belasco  Theatre 
have  been  taken  directly  from  those  made  for 
Napoleon  by  the  famous  architects  of  the  First 
Empire,  Charles  Percier  and  P.  F.  L.  Fontaine. 
The  Flying  Pegasus  and  the  Napoleonic  eagles 
were  originally  made  by  these  same  architects, 
who  built  and  decorated  Napoleon's  throne  room. 
The  applique  design  in  the  box  draperies  is  an 
exact  copy  of  that  used  in  the  palace  of  the  King 
of  Spain. 

The  general  coloring  is  autumnal,  the  rich  reds 
and  sombre  browns,  with  a  lingering  green  among 
them  all,  blending  the  seasons  in  a  restful  scheme 
of  color.  There  is  a  reception  room  on  every 
floor,  including  that  of  the  second  balcony.  A 
Marie  Antoinette  boudoir,  to  be  reached  from  the 
orchestra,  is  an  exact  duplicate  of  a  room  of  that 
period.  A  smoking-room  has  been  added  for  the 
comfort  of  guests.  Behind  the  scenes  the  old- 
fashioned  "  green  room "  has  been  revived.  As 
to  further  details  of  the  realm  behind  the  curtain, 
with  its  many  new  devices,  that  must  of  necessity 
remain  the  hidden  world  of  illusionment,  and 
more  —  the  land  of  camaraderie  in  art.  The 


14  TO-NIGHT 

mythical  place  where  inspiration  is  born  and 
romance  identified ;  where  all  that  the  heart  dares 
feel  the  lips  dare  say,  —  and  what  darings,  w  hat 
sayings  are  possible  in  the  sway  of  artistic 
camaraderie ! 

No  labor  of  art  is  too  long  or  too  great,  no 
creative  faculty  is  spared  —  imagination  and  tra- 
dition are  drained  to  the  dregs,  for  they  who 
build  under  the  laws  of  the  artist-world  measure 
as  high  as  the  stars.  There  is  no  greed  there, 
only  a  life  to  live,  a  soul  to  explore,  a  clasp  of 
the  hand  now  and  then,  a  work  to  do  by  labor 
of  love,  and  the  whole  standard  of  success  —  a 
word  of  sincere  approval. 


To-night  the  foot-lights  are  not  a  dividing  line, 
but  a  uniting  tie,  for  there  will  be  present  many 
old  friends,  some  personally  unknown  to  Mr. 
Belasco  and  Mrs.  Carter,  who  have  formed  their 
"  public  "  in  days  past,  and  to  whom  author  and 
player  have  always  labored  to  be  faithful. 

When  the  lights  are  dimmed  and  the  theatre  is 
empty,  there  will  remain  two  people  who  will 
consecrate  these  walls  with  a  deep  reverence  for 
what  they  represent  to  them. 

It  will  not  be  a  gratitude  for  material  prospects, 
just  a  deep  sigh  of  relief  that  one  more  mile-stone 
has  been  passed  since  they  began  their  work  in  art 
together. 


THE    STORY    OF    DU    BARRY 


STORY  of  DL 


MRS.  LESLIE   CARTER. 


THE 

STORY  of  DU  BARRY 

BY 

JAMES    L.    FORD 


With  Six  Full-Page  Illustrations  in  Photogravure  and 
Fifty-Five  Half-  Tone  Engravings 


NEW   YORK 
FREDERICK   A.  STOKES   COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1902, 
BY  FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 


Published  in  September,  1902 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    HISTORY  SETS  THE  STAGE 1 

II.    A  LOWLY   BEGINNING 19 

III.  ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER      ....  40 

IV.  A  NEW   SUN  ON  THE   HORIZON  OF  VER- 

SAILLES      72 

V.    PRESENTED  AT  COURT 94 

VI.    THE  PETIT  LEVEE Ill 

VII.    A  PRIME   MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL      .     .     .  138 

VIII.    THE  WAGES  OF  SIN .157 

IX.     MARIE  ANTOINETTE'S  REIGN 182 

X.    IN   RETIREMENT 217 

XI.     THE  STORM  BREAKS 240 

XII.     DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE       .....  258 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 

PHOTOGRAVURES 

Mrs.  Leslie  Carter Frontispiece 

The  Beginning  of  a  Great  Love      .  Facing  page    36 

A  New  Fancy "         "        92 

The  Favorite  of  Royalty  ....  "          "144 

"  Swear  on  the  Cross  !"....  "         "      274 

David  Belasco "         "280 

HALF-TONE  ENGRAVINGS 

"  Fascinating  Idlers  and  Handsome  Noble- 
men"        Page    7 

Reproduction  of  the   Original  Sign  of  the 

Milliner's  Shop "11 

With  her  Shopmates  at  Labille's     ....  "15 

Milliner's  Doll "21 

Something  New  in  Bonnets "23 

Jeanette  and  Cosse-Brissac "31 

Hurdy-gurdy  Player "35 

The  Belle  of  Labille's  Shop "41 


viii  LIST  OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

Copy  of  Affiche  actually  used  in  the  Shop 

of  Labille Page    47 

A  Noble  Scoundrel "       49 

Grands  Seignem*s "       57 

The  Corset  of  the  Period "       6l 

An  Ominous  Visit '•       65 

The  Soothsayer's  Prophecy "       73 

Orange  Woman "       77 

In  Comedy  Vein "       81 

Her  First  Meeting  with  the  King      ...  "89 

Objects  seen  in  the  Milliner's  Shop  ...  "       91 

Wooed  by  a  Royal  Lover "       97 

Sedan  Chair        "     105 

Jean  Du  Barry  and  Jeanette "107 

The  Flute-player "115 

Punch  Bowl "119 

A  Courtesy  to  Royalty     ........  "123 

The  Father  of  Cosse-Brissac "131 

Slippers "133 

The  Petit  Levee "139 

Screen  and  Toilet  Table "145 

A  Queen  of  the  Left  Hand "147 

Ecclesiastical  Homage "153 

Jeanette  and  the  Cardinal "159 

Zamore "     l6l 

The  Diversions  of  Royalty "     167 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  ix 

Louis  XV  Table Page  173 

Alone  with  the  King "175 

A  Loyal  Officer "183 

The  Du  Barry  Coffee  Cup "187 

A  Lover's  Peril "191 

With  the  Scent  of  the  Violets        ....  "199 

Veritable  Night  Table  actually  used  by  Du 

Barry  at  Versailles "203 

Fortiter  in  Modo "207 

The  Search  for  the  King's  Rival   ....  "213 

Bodyguard  of  Louis  XV "218 

At  the  Height  of  her  Power "219 

A  Kingly  Revel "227 

A  Corner  of  Du  Barry's  Bedchamber  in  the 

Palace  at  Versailles "233 

The  Clowns'  Gambol "235 

A  Woman's  Intercession "     243 

Spinnet  of  the  Period "247 

With  Breaking  Heart .  "251 

A  Jealous  King "259 

A  Corner  of  the  Property  Room    ....  "     265 

In  the  Garden  of  Louveciennes     ....  "     267 

Condemned  to  Die      .           "     275 

On  the  Way  to  Execution "283 


THE     STORY 
OF   DU   BARRY 


CHAPTER   ONE 

HISTORY    SETS    THE    STAGE 

NEVER  go  on  the  stage 
as  Du  Barry  without  see- 
ing that  awful  guillotine 
knife  shining  before  me 
in  every  scene  that  I 
play,"  said  Mrs.  Leslie 
Carter  one  night  just 
after  the  curtain  had  fallen  on  the  last 
act  of  Belasco's  drama ;  and  we  who  view 
the  play  from  before  the  footlights,  seeing 
every  scene  from  the  enlightened  stand- 
point of  latter-day  knowledge,  are  perhaps 
inclined  to  wonder  whether  any  vision  of 


2  THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

the  guillotine  ever  troubled  the  dreams  of 
Louis  XV,  Jeanette  Du  Barry  and  the  rest 
of  the  dissolute  court  that  went  dancing 
and  singing  down  the  road  that  at  last  be- 
came the  "  deluge  "  that  Pompadour  had 
foreseen  as  the  aftermath  of  it  all. 

It  seems  inevitable,  as  we  look  back  at  it 
now,  —  this  period  of  blood  and  vengeance 
that  was  the  outcome  of  so  many  decades 
of  luxury  in  high  places  and  bitter  poverty 
in  the  homes  of  the  lowly ;  yet  we  of  the 
present  day  can  no  more  read  the  future 
than  could  the  nobles  of  a  century  and  a 
half  ago  who  danced  and  drank  and  wore 
fine  clothes  and  cared  little  for  the  welfare 
of  France  so  long  as  they  basked  in  the 
favor  of  their  king. 

They  had  had  many  warnings  before  the 
storm  broke  in  its  awful  fury.  In  1757, 
Damiens,  the  shabby  man  with  the  pen- 
knife who  was  tortured  to  death  for  his 
futile  attempt  on  the  life  of  the  king,  had 
written  from  his  prison  cell  these  ominous 
words  : 

"  Sire,  I  am  sorry  that  I  was  so  unfor- 
tunate as  to  gain  access  to  you  ;  but  if  you 


HISTORY  SETS  THE   STAGE  3 

do  not  take  your  people's  part,  before  many 
years  you  and  the  dauphin  and  many  others 
will  perish." 

Earlier  than  that  the  philosophers  had 
sounded  the  note  of  protest  and  warning, 
generally  by  means  of  pamphlets  and  books 
hurled  into  France  from  some  rock  of  exile 
to  which  they  had  been  banished.  Vol- 
taire had  foreseen  what  destiny  had  in 
store  for  his  mal-governed  country  as  clearly 
as  had  Madame  de  Pompadour,  whose  re- 
mark "  after  us  the  deluge "  became  the 
by-word  of  her  royal  lover's  court. 

Sardou  has  said  that  when  History  makes 
a  drama,  the  work  is  well  done,  and  he 
speaks  with  a  modesty  that  well  becomes 
one  of  the  first  of  modern  French  drama- 
tists. He  might  have  added  that  History 
seldom  does  more  than  furnish  the  raw 
dramatic  material  which  the  playwright 
must  knead  into  dramatic  form,  even  as 
the  sculptor  kneads  the  rough  clay  into 
the  statue  which  he  imbues  with  his  own 
genius. 

In  the  case  of  Madame  Du  Barry,  the 
last  of  that  long  line  of  "  queens  of  the  left 


4  THE  STORY  OF  DU  BARRY 

hand "  whose  influence  was  so  potent  in 
French  statecraft  during  the  eighteenth 
century,  History  has  certainly  set  the  stage 
for  her  in  gorgeous  fashion,  and  made  ready 
for  her  first  entrance  by  years  of  Bourbon 
rule  which  brought  about  the  social  and 
political  conditions  under  which  she  played 
her  picturesque  and  interesting  part. 

The  age  in  which  she  lived  was  worse 
than  the  present  one,  in  that  a  certain 
number  of  men  and  women,  forming  the  so- 
called  "  privileged  classes,"  had  free  license 
to  do  a  great  many  things  that  their  coun- 
terparts of  to-day  would  like  to  do,  were  it 
not  for  the  force  of  public  opinion.  It  was 
an  age  of  wanton  luxury  and  indulgence 
for  the  few,  and  one  of  great  suffering 
and  misfortune  for  the  many.  Happily 
enough  for  the  purposes  of  the  drama,  the 
world  was  beginning  to  tire  of  these  con- 
ditions, and  was  preparing  for  a  great  up- 
heaval at  about  the  time  that  Madame  Du 
Barry  set  her  foot  upon  the  threshold  of 
her  destiny. 

The  fires  of  liberty  were  ready  for  kind- 
ling across  the  ocean,  where  George  Wash- 


HISTORY   SETS  THE   STAGE  5 

ington  of  Virginia  had  already  won  his 
spurs  in  the  French  and  Indian  war ;  and 
statesmen  like  John  Hancock  and  Samuel 
Adams  in  Massachusetts  were  beginning 
to  realize  that  there  could  be  no  loyalty 
and  contentment  in  the  colonies  so  long  as 
George  III  continued  to  regard  his  Ameri- 
can subjects  as  people  made  only  to  be 
taxed  for  his  benefit.  But  this  king  who, 
like  his  royal  brother  in  France,  believed 
that  he  ruled  by  divine  right,  paid  no  more 
heed  to  the  remonstrances  of  those  states- 
men of  the  colonies  whose  words  should 
have  had  weight,  than  Braddock,  the  Gen- 
eral Redvers-Buller  of  his  day  and  genera- 
tion, did  to  the  warnings  of  his  young  staff 
officer,  Washington,  who  had  had  his  ex- 
perience in  Indian  fighting  and  was  familiar 
with  the  red  men's  tricks. 

Braddock's  conceit  and  ignorance  led 
him  to  underestimate  the  strength  of  his 
enemy,  while  he  placed  an  absurdly  high 
value  on  his  own  prowess  and  the  advan- 
tage to  be  derived  from  fighting  the  red 
men  "  according  to  the  rules  of  war,"  so 
it  happens  that  the  story  of  his  defeat  and 


6  THE    STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

death  sounds  very  much  like  a  chapter  - 
almost  any  chapter  —  from  the  history  of 
the  Boer  war.  His  disposition  seems  to 
have  been  not  unlike  that  of  King  George, 
who  certainly  did  not  lose  his  American 
colonies  because  of  his  gracious  and  tactful 
methods  of  dealing  with  them. 

And  while  the  people  of  these  colonies 
were  preparing  for  the  struggle  from  which 
they  were  to  emerge  a  powerful  young 
nation,  one  whose  future  possibilities  even 
the  wisest  among  us  cannot  yet  predict, 
the  French  people,  who  had  been  ground 
down  by  years  of  Bourbon  misrule,  were 
being  driven  by  the  inexorable  force  of  cir- 
cumstances into  a  revolution  of  a  totally 
different  kind,  and  one  that  was  second 
only  to  our  own  in  its  effect  on  the  genera- 
tions that  were  to  come  after  it. 

There  is  nothing  in  our  civilization  of  to- 
day which  more  closely  resembles  what  is 
poetically  termed  the  "  ancien  regime  "  in 
France,  than  the  stockyards  in  Chicago, 
with  their  owners  as  the  Bourbon  king,  and 
the  sheep,  cattle,  and  pigs  as  the  people. 
This,  however,  is  not  quite  a  fair  compar- 


HISTORY  SETS   THE  STAGE  9 

ison,  as  the  cattle  are  supplied  with  food, 
drink,  and  shelter,  and  are  killed  instantly, 
and  not  permitted  to  drag  themselves  off  to 
remote  parts  of  the  field  and  there  die  of 
hunger,  disease,  or  their  wounds.  They 
are  of  no  use,  however,  except  to  be  killed, 
and  in  this  respect  they  bear  a  distinct 
resemblance  to  the  subjects  of  Louis, 
known  in  the  early  years  of  his  reign  as 
"the  well-beloved,"  and  of  his  predeces- 
sor, "the  grand  monarch,"  by  whom  the 
common  herd  were  looked  upon  as  good 
for  nothing  except  to  pay  taxes  and  stop 
bullets. 

Once  in  a  while  there  are  signs  of  revolt 
and  dissatisfaction  in  the  Chicago  stock- 
yard, and  in  like  manner,  even  before  the 
Du  Barry's  accession  to  power,  there  had 
been  signs  of  dissatisfaction  among  the 
human  cattle  of  her  august  lover.  But 
these  little  rebellions,  put  down  —  and 
often  by  hired  mercenaries  —  as  quickly 
as  they  were  begun,  were  nothing  more 
than  the  mere  angry  tossing  of  a  few  pairs 
of  horns,  or  a  squeal  of  defiance  from  some 
far-seeing  pig,  drawing  back  from  the 


10         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

shambles  in   a   vain   effort   to   escape   his 
predestined  fate. 

For  the  human  cattle  who  made  up  the 
bulk  of  the  population  of  France,  far  less 
consideration  was  shown  than  for  their 
hoofed  and  horned  counterparts  in  Chicago, 
for  it  was  the  fortune  of  the  first-named  to 
be  ruled  absolutely  by  a  selfish,  pleasure- 
loving  monarch  who  believed  that  he  gov- 
erned by  divine  right,  and  that  those  who 
lived  under  his  dominion  could  have  no 
higher  duty  to  perform  than  that  of  servile 
obedience  to  his  will.  He  it  was  who  could 
consign  men  with  whom,  perhaps,  he  had 
supped  and  walked  and  talked  the  day  be- 
fore, to  a  living  death  in  the  Bastille,  merely 
to  satisfy  his  own  anger  or  the  jealous  whim 
of  a  mistress.  He  it  was  who  stood  watch- 
ing the  funeral  procession  of  his  dead  love, 
Madame  de  Pompadour,  as  it  started  from 
the  courtyard  in  Versailles  for  Paris,  and 
remarked,  as  he  drummed  with  idle  fingers 
on  the  window-pane,  "  Madame  la  Marquise 
will  have  a  wet  day  for  her  ride."  He  it  was 
who,  in  the  early  years  of  his  reign,  gained 
the  surname  of  "well-beloved,"  and  who, 


HISTORY   SETS  THE   STAGE 


11 


at  the  end,  was  hustled  into  the  ground  with 
less  ceremony  and  respect  than  would  have 
been  shown  to  one  of  his  own  valets. 

Yet  such  was  the  divinity  that 
did  hedge  this  king,  this  splen- 
did  type    of  the    Bourbon 
who    could   neither   learn, 
nor  forgive,  nor  for- 
get, that  the  greatest 
ladies  in  his  court 
vied  with  one  an- 
other   for    the 
honor  of  filling 
the  position 
left    vacant 
by  the  death 
of  Madame  de 
Pompadour. 

But  Louis 
XV  would  have  none  of  them.  "  I  will 
never  choose  another  mistress  from  the 
ranks  of  the  nobility,"  he  said.  "  It 's  too 
much  trouble  to  get  rid  of  them  when  they 
pall  upon  me." 

Lord  Chesterfield  once  said  of  him  :  "  By 
an  unusual  combination,  Louis  XV  was  both 


Reproduction  of  tJie  original  sign  of  the 
milliner's  slwp. 


12         THE  STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

hated  and  despised,"  and  to  the  day  of  his 
death  he  never  realized  the  awful  and  bloody 
depth  of  the  abyss  that  lay  directly  beneath 
his  feet  and  those  of  the  wigged  and  per- 
fumed courtiers  who  helped  him  in  his  life- 
long race  after  pleasure,  with  ennui  following 
close  upon  his  heels.  To  the  very  end  he 
lived  only  for  himself,  regarding  the  remon- 
strances of  his  cabinet  and  the  opposition  of 
his  parliament  as  merely  the  outward  and 
visible  signs  of  a  revolutionary  spirit  which 
must  be  crushed  at  all  hazards.  He  went 
to  his  death  still  firmly  believing  that  he 
had  ruled  by  divine  right,  and  little  dream- 
ing that  the  Almighty,  on  whom  he  had 
sought  to  throw  the  responsibility  for  so 
much  evil,  was  even  then  forging  a  thunder- 
bolt that  was  destined  to  involve  Europe  in 
a  storm  of  unexampled  violence,  —  one  that 
would  in  the  end  clear  the  political  skies 
and  leave  the  atmosphere  freer  and  purer 
than  ever  before. 

Within  three  months  after  the  formal 
presentation  of  Madame  Du  Barry  at  the 
court  of  her  king  and  lover,  Napoleon 
Bonaparte  was  born  in  the  Island  of  Cor- 


HISTORY  SETS  THE   STAGE         13 

sica.  He  took  the  field  at  a  surprisingly 
early  age,  but  that  was  because  he  was 
sorely  needed,  and  the  world  had  waited  for 
him  till  its  patience  had  long  since  been 
exhausted. 

Such,  in  brief,  were  the  conditions  under 
which  History  prepared  the  French  stage 
for  Jeanette  Du  Barry's  life-drama ;  but 
although  she  furnished  a  gorgeous  setting, 
and  associated  her  with  various  men  and 
women  of  great  historic  and  dramatic 
value,  the  work  of  building  a  play  was  left, 
as  it  always  is  in  such  cases,  to  be  done 
by  the  dramatist. 

For  example,  in  Julius  Cassar,  the  greatest 
of  all  historical  dramas,  History  has  sup- 
plied the  raw  material  in  the  shape  of  the 
life  of  Caesar,  his  murder,  the  events  that 
led  up  to  it,  and  its  immediate  results. 
From  this  splendid  material  Shakespeare 
constructed  a  drama  which  has  done  more 
than  all  else  that  has  been  written  about 
Julius  Csesar  to  impress  upon  the  world 
the  tragic  story  of  his  fall.  In  doing  this, 
he  did  not  content  himself  with  arranging  a 
number  of  scenes  from  the  life  of  the  great 


14         THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

Roman  emperor  in  order  that  his  drama 
might  be  historically  accurate  in  trivial  as 
well  as  in  important  details.  Had  he  done 
this,  no  matter  if  he  had  clothed  his  work 
in  language  as  beautiful  and  convincing  as 
that  which  still  lives  in  his  deathless  drama, 
his  work  would  not  have  survived  a  dozen 
representations,  —  in  fact,  it  would  not  have 
been  a  play  at  all. 

But  Shakespeare  was  a  genius  and  not 
a  mere  cataloguer  of  events,  and  when  it 
came  to  dealing  with  such  a  tremendous 
theme  as  that  of  the  Roman  conspiracy 
and  the  tragedy  which  it  brought  about, 
he  set  his  imagination  to  work,  and  the 
touch  of  his  genius  transformed  the  dull 
clay  of  history  into  a  living,  breathing  story 
that  has  touched  the  hearts  of  generations 
of  playgoers  and  will  continue  to  charm 
and  interest  and  instruct  so  long  as  the 
English  language  shall  be  spoken.  He 
invented  the  quarrel  between  Brutus  and 
Cassius.  He  invented  the  great  speech  of 
Brutus  to  the  Roman  people.  He  invented 
that  masterpiece  of  subtle,  convincing  ora- 
tory in  which  the  brilliant  Marc  Antony 


w 

•*» 
<: 

-si 


HISTORY   SETS  THE   STAGE         17 

stirs  the  very  stones  of  Rome  to  rise  and 
mutiny.  In  short,  the  world  is  indebted  to 
the  illuminating  genius  of  the  playwright, 
and  not  to  a  mere  recorder  of  history,  for 
nearly  every  one  of  the  great  scenes  and 
speeches  which  have  kept  alive  in  the 
hearts  of  generation  after  generation  of 
humanity  the  impressive  story  of  Caesar's 
fall. 

It  is  a  far  cry  from  Shakespeare  to  Ros- 
tand, in  time  and  in  other  respects  as  well, 
but  apart  from  the  interest  that  attaches 
itself  to  every  chapter  and  paragraph  of  the 
Napoleonic  story,  what  dramatic  value  do 
we  find  in  the  life  of  that  "  dove  that  found 
birth  within  an  eagle's  nest,"  the  Due  de 
Reichstadt  ?  None  whatever,  excepting 
that  which  the  dramatist  has  invented. 
Even  the  character  which  Madame  Bern- 
hardt  portrayed  with  so  much  art  is  one  in 
which  Metternich,  could  he  return  to  earth, 
would  probably  fail  to  recognize  the  unfor- 
tunate young  prince  whose  unhappy  destiny 
he  helped  to  shape.  But  Rostand  is  per- 
fectly justified  in  what  he  has  done. 

Given  the  son  of  the  world's  conqueror, 


18         THE   STORY  OF  DU  BARRY 

baptized  at  Notre  Dame  amid  the  acclama- 
tions of  all  Paris,  anointed  in  the  cradle 
with  the  oil  by  the  virtue  of  which  he  was 
to  rule  by  divine  right,  and  accustomed 
from  his  very  earliest  childhood  to  the  cere- 
monial deference  due  him  not  only  as  a 
king,  but  also  as  the  only  son  of  one  who 
was  almost  a  demigod  in  the  eyes  of  his 
people,  it  was  only  fair  to  assume  that  the 
fires  of  ambition  burned  fiercely  within 
his  breast,  although,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
they  did  not.  And  it  is  on  this  perfectly 
justifiable  assumption  that  the  play  of 
"  L' Aiglon  "  is  constructed.  The  real  Na- 
poleon's son,  whom  we  find  in  the  pages 
of  veracious,  unimaginative  history,  could 
not  have  been  made  to  serve  as  the  central 
figure  of  a  drama,  because  he  did  not  possess 
the  requisite  attributes. 


CHAPTER   II 

A    LOWLY    BEGINNING 

HE  life  of  Madame  Du 
Barry,  while  not  afford- 
ing in  itself  as  much  in 
the  way  of  raw  dramatic 
material  as  does  that  of 
Julius  Csesar,  has  never- 
theless been  fashioned 
into  a  stage  story  of  deep  human  interest, 
set  in  brilliant  surroundings,  and  far  better 
suited  to  the  tastes  of  modern  audiences 
than  that  of  the  poor  little  king  of  Rome. 
It  is,  moreover,  a  story  which,  while  follow- 
ing the  true  course  of  history  more  closely 
than  almost  any  successful  historical  play  of 
modern  times,  is  nevertheless  sufficiently 
charged  with  the  dramatist's  imagination 
to  seem  in  the  eyes  of  twentieth  century 


20         THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

audiences  an  intensely  interesting  picture 
of  what  might  very  well  have  happened  at 
the  court  of  the  French  king. 

Historians  differ  widely  as  to  the  real 
character  of  this  last  of  the  Favorites,  a  cir- 
cumstance not  to  be  wondered  at  when  we 
study  the  conditions  under  which  she  lived, 
and  take  into  account  the  extreme  of  adu- 
lation on  the  one  hand  and  execration  on  the 
other  that  were  the  natural  results  of  the 
king's  fondness  for  her.  These  historians 
differ  also  as  to  her  parentage,  the  date  of 
her  birth,  the  exact  extent  of  her  power, 
and  in  scores  of  other  respects. 

It  is  certain,  however,  that  she  was 
born  in  Vaucouleurs,  the  same  little 
French  village  in  which  Joan  of  Arc  first 
saw  the  light  nearly  three  hundred  and 
fifty  years  before.  Indeed,  Anne  Becu, 
the  mother  of  Du  Barry,  always  claimed  a 
blood-relationship  with  the  Maid  of  Or- 
leans, a  boast  which  it  would  probably  have 
been  difficult  for  her  to  substantiate.  Cer- 
tain it  is  that  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century  the  Becu  family  was  not  one  of 
great  distinction,  most  of  its  members  being 


A   LOWLY  BEGINNING 


engaged  in  domestic  service,  while  the 
certificate  of  Madame  Du  Barry's  birth, 
taken  from  the  parish  records  in  the  town 
of  Vaucouleurs,  describes  her  as  "  Jeanette, 
natural  daughter  of  Anne  Becu,  sometimes 
called  Quantigny,  born  on  the 
19th  of  August,  in  the  year  one 
thousand  seven  hundred  and 
forty-three,  and  baptized  the 
same  day." 

Who  little  Jeanette's  fath- 
er was  will  never  be  known. 
Tradition  and  history  assert 
variously  that  he  was  a  tax- 
collector,  a  sailor,  and  an 
unfrocked  monk  named  Gomard 
de  Vaubernier.  From  these  possi- 
ble parents,  Mr.  Belasco  selected  the  last 
named  as  being  more  interesting  than  either 
of  the  others,  and  he  actually  introduces 
him  for  a  moment  in  the  first  act  of  the 
drama  in  the  guise  of  a  shoe-cleaner,  fitted 
out  with  his  elaborate  contrivance  for  clean- 
ing shoes  and  imparting  to  them  the  dead 
lustreless  finish  that  was  in  vogue  in  Louis 
XV's  time. 


Milliner's 
Doll. 


22         THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

In  her  own  memoirs,1  Madame  Du  Barry 
gives  her  birth  as  the  28th  of  August,  1746, 
and  passes  over  the  maternal  claim  to  kin- 
ship with  the  inspired  maid  as  if  she  put 
no  faith  in  it.  She  speaks  of  her  father  as 
a  man  without  fortune  who  had  accepted  a 
mean  situation  as  clerk  at  the  Barrieres,  and 
who  had  married  her  mother  from  love. 
The  reason  for  this  will  be  shown  in  an- 
other chapter. 

But,  whether  married  or  no,  Jeanette's 
mother  found  herself,  a  few  years  after  the 
birth  of  her  daughter,  absolutely  without 
resources,  and  set  out  for  Paris  with  the 
intention  of  trying  her  luck  there.  Through 
the  kindness  of  a  financier  named  Duinon- 
ceau,  Jeanette  was  sent  to  the  Convent  of 


1  The  four  volumes  purporting  to  be  the  memoirs  of  the 
Countess  Du  Barry  have  been  drawn  on  guardedly  for  some 
of  the  material  of  lesser  importance  contained  in  this  book. 
In  all  probability  these  memoirs  are  largely  apocryphal,  but 
they  have  been  compiled,  if  not  entirely  by  Madame  Du  Barry 
herself,  at  least  by  some  one  who  was  thoroughly  familiar 
with  the  history  of  her  time,  as  well  as  with  her  own  career, 
and  who,  for  reasons  of  his  own,  did  not  wish  to  place  his 
own  name  on  the  title-page.  Other  examples  can  be  named 
of  books  which  contain  a  vast  amount  of  accurate  and  inter- 
esting information  of  a  personal  and  delicate  nature,  and 
which  are  nevertheless  apocryphal  as  to  signature. 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  25 

Sainte-Aure.  This  convent  was  designed 
as  a  retreat  for  young  girls  whose  condition 
in  life  was  such  as  to  expose  them  to  temp- 
tation, and  here  Jeanette  remained  until  she 
was  nearly  fifteen.  During  all  these  years 
she  lived  a  life  of  such  extreme  rigor  that 
her  subsequent  relapse  from  austere  virtue 
is  not  to  be  wondered  at.  It  was  an  ex- 
istence of  terrible  severity  for  children  as 
young  as  she.  Clothed  in  an  ugly  dress, 
deprived  of  all  the  little  ornaments  that 
children  hold  dear,  forbidden  to  laugh, 
jest  or  play  with  her  little  companions, 
and  obliged  to  devote  most  of  her  time  to 
work,  nothing  but  her  elasticity  of  spirit 
and  marvellous  birthright  of  roguish,  infec- 
tious gayety  enabled  her  to  remain  in  the 
dreary  Convent  of  Sainte-Aure  as  long  as 
she  did. 

Soon  after  leaving  the  convent,  her 
mother  lost  her  situation,  and  the  young 
girl  began  to  earn  her  living  by  going  from 
door  to  door  in  Paris  and  the  near-by  coun- 
try with  a  little  open  box  of  watch-guards, 
imitation  pearls,  brilliants,  and  snuff-boxes 
which  she  offered  for  sale.  Through  the 


26         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

influence  of  a  certain  Madame  Lagarde,  the 
girl  was  removed  from  the  temptations  of 
the  street  and  retained  by  her  as  a  sort  of 
lady's  companion  in  her  Chateau  Cour- 
Neuve.  The  old  lady  was  charmed  with 
the  growing  beauty  and  bright,  amusing 
chatter  of  her  new  retainer,  and,  for  a  time, 
all  went  well. 

It  was  at  Madame  Lagarde's  that  she 
gained  that  familiarity  with  certain  of  the 
outward  and  visible  signs  of  high  breeding 
which  stood  her  in  such  good  stead  when 
in  after  years  she  was  first  admitted  to  the 
intimate  circle  of  courtiers  that  clustered 
about  the  French  king.  Among  those 
who  frequented  the  house  were  Voltaire, 
at  that  time  the  most  powerful,  most 
quoted,  most  feared,  and  most  sought-after 
man  in  the  kingdom ;  M.  Marmontel,  the 
author  of  the  famous  "  Moral  Tales,"  and 
M.  Grimm,  whom  she  describes  as  "  a  cun- 
ning fox,  witty,  though  a  German,  very 
ugly  and  very  thin."  Besides  these  men 
of  literary  renown,  Madame  Lagarde's  salon 
was  frequented  by  such  aristocrats  as  the 
Due  de  Richelieu,  the  Prince  de  Soubise, 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  27 

and  the  Due  de  Brissac,  whose  son  was 
destined  to  play  a  part  of  no  mean  impor- 
tance in  the  story  of  her  later  years.  Un- 
fortunately, however,  Madame  Lagarde 
had  a  young  son  living  with  her,  and  it  was 
not  long  before  she  discovered  and  nipped 
in  the  bud  a  love  affair  between  the  two 
young  people  which  had  made  a  most 
promising  beginning.  Jeanette,  cast  once 
more  upon  her  own  resources,  entered, 
under  the  name  of  Lancon  —  that  of  the 
new  husband  whom  her  mother  had  just 
taken  —  the  millinery  establishment  of 
Monsieur  Labille  in  the  rue  Saint- Honore. 

Here,  although  safe  from  the  brutal 
temptations  of  the  street,  she  was  exposed 
to  others  that  were  far  more  dangerous. 

"  Imagine,"  says  that  conscientious  and 
entertaining  chronicler,  M.  de  Goncour, 
"stores  with  glass  windows  all  around, 
where  fascinating  idlers  and  handsome 
noblemen  kept  ogling  the  girls  from  morn- 
ing till  night ;  shutters  which  were  used 
for  correspondence  and  which  allowed  the 
notes,  folded  up  fan-fashion,  to  be  passed 
through  the  peg  holes  ;  little  trips  out  of 


28         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

doors  where  the  smart  milliner's  girl,  such 
as  Leclerc  has  sketched  her  in  the  series  of 
costumes  of  D'Esnoult  and  Repilly,  trotted 
about  with  a  conquering  air,  her  head  cov- 
ered with  a  big  black  hat  shaped  like  a 
calash,  allowing  her  fair  curls  to  slip  down 
her  rounded  shapely  waist,  squeezed  into  a 
polonaise  of  printed  calico,  trimmed  with 
muslin.  Imagine,  at  the  end  of  all  this, 
conversations  and  proposals  and,  after  the 
proposals  and  the  responses  to  the  proposals, 
it  was  for  nearly  every  one  of  them,  as  it  was 
for  the  little  Lan9on  girl,  some  Monsieur 
Lavauvelarbiere  (one  of  Jeanette's  early 
lovers)  or  some  Monsieur  Duval  or  some- 
body else." 

This  picture  we  may  supplement  with 
one  given  in  Madame  Du  Barry's  own 
words  : 

"  I  now  commenced  a  new  existence,  and  how 
different  a  one  from  that  I  had  led  at  Sainte-Aure ! 
There,  all  was  wearisome  and  dull ;  there,  the  least 
motion,  a  word,  a  burst  of  laughter,  was  kept  in 
check,  and  sometimes  we  were  severely  punished. 
At  Madame  Labille's  there  was  a  constant  watch 
to  keep  the  house  in  order  and  regularity;  but 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  29 

how  different  from  the  unceasing  surveillance  of 
the  convent !  Here  we  were  almost  mistresses  of  our 
own  actions,  provided  the  allotted  portions  of  our 
work  were  properly  done.  We  might  talk  of  any- 
thing that  came  into  our  heads ;  we  were  at  liberty 
to  laugh  at  anything  that  provoked  our  mirth,  and 
we  might  sing  as  much  as  we  pleased.  And  we  did 
chatter,  laugh  and  sing  to  an  unlimited  extent.  Out 
of  the  shop  on  Sunday,  we  were  at  perfect  liberty 
and  at  equal  liberty  in  our  chambers,  which  were 
situated  at  the  top  of  the  house.  Each  of  us  had 
her  room,  which  was  small  but  very  neat.  My  god- 
father had  mine  decorated  with  a  handsome  carpet, 
and  gave  me  a  commode,  a  pier-glass,  a  small  table, 
four  chairs,  and  an  armchair  of  velvet,  magnificently 
gilt.  This  was  all  luxury,  and  when  my  fellow- 
apprentices  came  to  see  my  apartment,  the  richness 
of  the  furniture  excited  surprise  and  universal  ad- 
miration. For  at  least  four  and  twenty  hours  the 
sole  theme  of  conversation  at  Madame  Labille's  was 
the  chamber  of  Mademoiselle  Lancon." 

It  is  not  easy  for  us  of  the  present  age  to 
imagine  such  an  establishment  as  that  in 
which  little  Jeanette  found  employment. 
Patronized  by  women  of  the  very  highest 
social  position,  it  was  at  the  same  time  con- 
stantly frequented  by  the  most  notorious  of 
female  harpies,  while  it  kept  in  stock  sword- 


30         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

knots,  shoe-buckles,  and  other  articles  of 
male  adornment,  the  sale  of  which  furthered 
those  free  and  easy  flirtations  between  the 
apprentices  and  the  idle  men  of  the  town 
which  were  carried  on  across  the  counters 
without  even  the  pretence  of  concealment. 
Moreover,  we  must  bear  in  mind  the  fact 
that  in  the  France  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury millinery  and  dressmaking  were  in- 
dustries of  the  highest  importance  in  the 
economic  life  of  the  nation,  and  the  crea- 
tions of  such  a  shop  as  that  of  Labille  were 
viewed  by  everybody  and  discussed  seriously 
like  works  of  art. 

At  that  time  French  taste  governed  the 
entire  world  in  matters  of  dress  and  adorn- 
ment, as  for  that  matter  it  did  a  century 
later  during  the  Second  Empire.  The 
new  fashions  for  each  season  emanated  from 
the  court  of  the  king,  and  were  sent  abroad 
by  means  of  a  manikin  called  "  the  great 
doll  of  France,"  which  was  dressed  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  very  latest  styles,  and 
sent  to  every  court  of  Europe  in  charge  of 
an  envoy  and  a  numerous  suite  of  attaches 
and  lackeys.  So  much  importance  did 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  33 

foreigners  of  fashion  and  distinction  attach 
to  the  visits  of  this  doll,  the  forerunner  of 
the  modern  fashion-plate,  which  was  of 
course  unknown  then,  that  once,  during  the 
Seven  Years'  War,  when  the  British  had 
established  such  a  complete  blockade  of  the 
French  ports  that  it  was  impossible  for  a 
single  ship  to  break  through  the  cordon,  an 
exception  was  made  in  favor  of  the  vessel 
bearing  the  great  d6ll  of  France,  which  was 
allowed  to  cross  the  channel. 

And  it  is  with  no  small  degree  of  pride 
that  French  historians  describe  the  manner 
in  which  the  flags  of  the  enemy's  fleet  were 
dipped  in  salutation  to  the  ship  bearing  the 
doll  and  its  accompanying  embassy  on  its 
way  to  teach  the  English  how  to  dress 
themselves  properly. 

It  was  toward  the  close  of  a  reign  char- 
acterized by  luxury  in  personal  adornment, 
wanton  licentiousness,  and  selfish  indiffer- 
ence to  the  needs  of  others,  —  a  rococo  age  of 
elaborate  ceremonial,  superficial  ornament, 
and  over-gilding, — and  in  a  shop  that  might 
very  well  have  contributed  to  the  outfit  of 
the  great  doll  of  France,  that  Jeanette 


34         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

Vaubernier  first  made  her  bow.  She  was 
then  at  the  very  dawn  of  womanhood,  and 
equipped  with  gifts  of  personal  beauty  and 
coquetry  which  made  her,  from  the  very 
first,  the  object  of  gallant  attentions  on  the 
part  of  the  young  men  of  fashion  who  flut- 
tered about  the  rue  Saint- Honore,  and 
awakened  the  immediate  interest  of  the 
buzzards  of  both  sexes,  who  were  more  in 
evidence  then  in  Paris  than  ever  before  or 
since,  and  forever  on  the  lookout  for  some 
attractive  bit  of  femininity  which  could  be 
added  to  the  stock  and  trade  of  their  hideous 
traffic. 

The  peculiar  clientele  of  the  Labille  shop 
must  be  borne  in  mind  if  we  are  to  judge 
this  young  milliner's  girl  fairly,  and  we  must 
also  take  into  consideration  her  daily  sur- 
roundings and  the  mode  of  life  of  her 
companions  and  shopmates.  And  these 
young  women,  had  they  been  taken  to 
task  by  any  of  the  professional  reformers 
of  their  day,  would  undoubtedly  have 
justified  their  conduct  on  the  ground  that 
they  were  merely  following  the  example 
set  by  the  very  highest  women  of  the  no- 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING 


35 


bility,  and  winked  at   by  the   princes   of 
the  church. 

Nor  can  we  in  fairness  regard  the  excuse 
as  a  lame  one,  for  at  that  time  the  post  of 
Favorite  at  the  king's  court  was 
one  that  was  openly  coveted, 
and  shamelessly  sought  by 
women  who  bore  the 
proudest  names  in  the 
kingdom. 

As  for  the  men  with 
whom  Jeanette  was  now 
brought  in  contact,  they 
were  worthy  members  of 
a  society  of  such  exalted 
ideas  that  it  could  conceive 
of  no  finer  or  more  to  be 
desired  post  than  that  of 
Favorite  to  a  king  who  had 
long  since  grown  weary 
of  all  womankind  and  was 
as  difficult  to  please  as  a  man  might  well 
be  who  had  followed  pleasure  through 
youth,  manhood,  and  up  to  the  begin- 
nings of  old  age  and  to  the  very  point  of 
satiety. 


Hurdy-gurdy  player. 


36         THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

No  man  or  woman  would  have  been 
deemed  worthy  of  a  place  in  the  corrupt 
court  of  this  blase  monarch  who  did  not 
stand  ready  at  a  moment's  notice  to  sac- 
rifice to  his  pleasure  a  wife,  sister  or 
daughter,  as  his  taste  might  dictate.  It 
was  this  spirit  of  loyalty  to  the  person  of 
their  sovereign  that  had  much  to  do  with 
the  development  of  the  race  of  "grands 
seigneurs"  -  courtly  gentlemen  bearing 
splendid  historic  names,  wearing  exquis- 
itely ruffled  clothes,  and  carrying  at  their 
sides  slender,  jewel-hilted  swords  which  they 
were  always  ready  to  draw  in  defence  of 
their  king,  or  of  what  they  wrere  pleased 
to  term  their  honor.  These  were  the  men 
who  deemed  it  an  honor  to  sacrifice  a  wife 
or  sister  to  the  king's  whim,  and  it  is 
pleasant  to  learn  from  the  pages  of  history 
that  His  Majesty  was  always  willing  to 
pay  handsomely  for  such  proofs  of  loyalty 
on  the  part  of  husband  or  brother. 

There  were,  however,  in  the  ranks  of  the 
nobility,  men  who  could  be  singled  out  as 
notable  exceptions  to  the  rule  of  dishonor 
and  licentiousness  that  prevailed  at  the 


The  Beginning  of  a  Great  Love. 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  37 

court  of  King  Louis,  and  one  of  these  was 
that  distinguished  and  gallant  gentleman, 
the  Due  de  Cosse-Brissac,  Governor  of 
Paris  and  Colonel  of  the  Cent  Gardes  du 
Roi,  whose  after  life  was  so  curiously  bound 
up  with  that  of  the  humble  little  milliner's 
girl,  Jeanette  Lancon. 

It  was  this  nobleman  whom  the  king 
bade  to  take  courage,  and  not  grieve  over 
so  small  a  disaster  as  a  scandal  that  affected 
the  fair  name  of  one  of  his  female  rela- 
tives. And  to  this  he  made  answer : 

"  Sire,  I  trust  that  I  have  courage  to 
bear  resignedly  any  disaster,  though  none 
to  support  dishonor." 

All  historians  unite  in  singling  out  this 
nobleman  from  the  others  of  his  day  as  a 
man  worthy  of  the  highest  praise  for  the 
lofty  purity  of  his  character. 

"  His  romantic  devotion  to  Jeanette  Du 
Barry,"  says  one  of  these  chroniclers,  "  is 
indeed  singular.  For  many  years,  until 
he  fell  a  victim  to  the  Revolution,  he  paid 
her  a  sort  of  passionate  worship ;  such  as, 
in  the  old  romances  of  chivalry,  gallant 
knights  were  supposed  to  render  to  the 


38         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

ladies  to  whom  they  had  sworn  fealty. 
Before  his  death  he  made  a  will  providing 
handsomely  for  her,  and  recommending  her 
to  the  care  of  his  nearest  of  kin  as  one 
'  who  has  been  very  dear '  to  him." 

But  it  was  not  every  young  milliner's 
girl  who  had  the  good  fortune  to  win  the 
chivalrous  devotion  of  such  a  man  as  the 
Due  de  Cosse-Brissac.  They  were  men 
of  a  very  different  sort  who  came  crowding 
into  Labille's  shop,  ostensibly  to  look  at 
sword-knots  or  the  latest  design  in  shoe- 
buckles,  but  in  reality  to  flirt  with  the 
young  girls,  to  invite  them  to  theatre  and 
supper  parties,  and  to  arrange  with  them 
for  meetings  on  Sundays  and  holidays. 
The  esteem  in  which  they  held  these 
young  apprentices  may  easily  be  imagined. 
And  if  they  could  traffic  openly  in  the 
honor  of  wife  or  sister  without  loss  of 
caste,  who  can  blame  these  girls  for  regard- 
ing their  attentions  as  a  distinction  to  be 
proud  of? 

The  modern  biped  whose  mission  in  life 
is  to  follow  and  insult  young  women  who 
work  for  a  living  is  a  despicable  creature, 


A   LOWLY   BEGINNING  39 

but  he  is  a  high-minded  gentleman  in 
comparison  with  some  of  the  "  grand  sei- 
gneurs "  who  used  to  haunt  the  milliner's 
shop  of  Madame  Labille,  and  we  cannot 
fairly  estimate  her  character  without  taking 
theirs  into  account  as  well. 


CHAPTER  III 

ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER 

ADAME     LABILLE 

was  the  real  owner  of 
the  shop  which  was  con- 
ducted, for  form's  sake, 
in  her  husband's  name. 
It  was  situated  in  the 
rue  St.  Honore  at  the 
corner  of  the  rue  Neuf-des-Petits-Champs, 
since  made  world-famous  in  Thackeray's 
"  Ballad  of  Bouillabaisse."  It  is  in  this 
shop  that  the  dramatist  first  reveals  his 
heroine  as  a  light-hearted,  roguish  girl, 
ready  to  flirt  with  any  one  who  comes 
along,  no  matter  whether  he  be  soldier  or 
prelate,  perfectly  willing  to  borrow  for  her 
own  use  the  new  hat  which  has  just  been 
made  for  a  princess,  and  obviously  a  girl 
who  is  on  the  best  of  terms  with  herself 


ENTERING   UPON   HER   CAREER     43 

and  every  one  about  her.  The  same  quali- 
ties of  character  and  disposition  which 
made  her  popular  with  her  shopmates, 
which  won  the  love  of  her  employer  and 
held  it,  too,  to  the  very  day  of  her  execu- 
tion, are  the  qualities  which  enchained  the 
fancy  of  Louis  XV  the  first  time  that 
he  saw  her,  and  enabled  her  to  hold  her 
place  as  Favorite  until  the  end  of  his  reign. 
In  the  play  the  shop  in  which  Jeanette 
Vaubernier  actually  worked  is  reproduced 
as  nearly  as  possible,  and  the  back  of  the 
scene  is  so  constructed  that,  reversed,  it  is 
used  to  reveal  the  exterior  in  the  final  act 
of  the  drama.  In  all  respects  this  scene  is 
a  perfect  study  of  a  milliner's  shop  of  that 
period.  The  affiche,  or  sign,  which  hangs 
on  the  wall,  is  an  exact  copy  of  the  one 
which  was  actually  displayed  in  Labille's 
shop.  And  if  we  read  it  writh  the  aid  of 
opera-glasses,  we  learn  precisely  what  sort 
of  goods  were  sold  there.  These  very 
goods  are  displayed  in  the  mimic  scene, 
and  are  of  great  variety,  for  the  milliner 
of  Louis  XV's  time  not  only  made  hats 
and  bonnets,  but  also  kept  a  large  stock  of 


44         THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

silks,  muslins,  and  other  dress  fabrics,  to- 
gether with  buckles,  high-heeled  slippers, 
sword-knots,  and  other  articles  of  wear  and 
adornment. 

The  benches  scattered  about  the  room 
for  the  convenience  of  the  customers  are 
copied  from  those  in  use  at  that  time,  and 
the  bandboxes  are  specially  designed  for 
hats  that  were  larger  and  much  more  elab- 
orate than  those  that  are  worn  at  the  pres- 
ent day.  The  sedan  chair  that  stops  for  a 
single  moment  before  the  door  is  well 
worth  the  attention  of  the  serious  student 
of  the  Louis  XV  period.  It  is  an  exact 
copy  of  the  one  used  by  the  Polish  princess 
who  became  the  wife  of  Louis  and  the 
Queen  of  France,  and  it  opens  in  such  a 
way  as  to  admit  the  elaborately  large  head- 
dresses which  were  in  fashion  during  her 
time. 

It  was  during  her  apprenticeship  in  this 
shop  that  Madame  Du  Barry,  according  to 
her  own  confession,  had  her  first  love  affair. 
Her  sweetheart  was  a  young  pastry-cook 
named  Nicolas  Mothon,  and  his  lowly  sta- 
tion in  life  excited  the  contempt  of  the 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  45 

other  young  women  in  the  shop,  whose 
adorers  were  either  notaries  or  barrister's 
clerks,  students  or  soldiers. 

That  her  attachment  for  her  humble 
lover  was  genuine  cannot  be  doubted,  for 
years  afterward  when,  at  the  close  of  her 
remarkable  career  she  had  retired  to  pri- 
vate life,  this  woman  who  had  basked  in 
the  supreme  favor  of  her  king  wrote  as 
follows  :  "  When  I  call  to  remembrance 
all  those  who  have  adored  me,  shall  I  say 
that  it  is  not  poor  Nicolas,  perhaps,  who 
pleased  me  least !  I,  too,  have  known 
what  first  love  is." 

In  the  drama  there  is  no  Nicolas  the 
pastry-cook.  Wisely  enough,  Mr.  Belasco 
has  disregarded  whatever  claims  to  priority 
he  may  have  possessed,  and  plunged  at 
once  into  the  one  true,  enduring,  and  credi- 
table love  affair  that  runs  through  the  life 
of  his  heroine. 

Young  Cosse-Brissac  appears  in  the  very 
first  act,  an  ideal  French  lover,  ardent, 
chivalrous  and  handsome.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  although  history  does  not  speak  defi- 
nitely on  the  subject,  the  young  noble  did 


46         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

not  make  known  his  love  for  her  until 
some  years  later ;  but,  in  deference  to 
dramatic  exigencies,  this  affair  of  the  heart 
is  made  to  date  from  the  very  beginning 
of  the  drama.  He  comes  to  see  her  in  the 
shop,  and  she  flirts  with  him  across  the 
counter,  while  pretending  to  wait  on  one 
of  the  customers.  He  brings  her  flowers, 
too,  —  a  bunch  of  violets,  —  and  their  fra- 
grance permeates  the  whole  play.  In  as- 
suming that  this  love  affair  was  a  pure  and 
honorable  one  throughout,  Mr.  Belasco  does 
not  violate  historical  truth,  —  though  he 
would  be  perfectly  justified  in  so  doing,  - 
but  simply  avails  himself  of  the  fact  that 
history  tells  us  nothing  positively  to  the 
contrary. 

Moreover,  he  has  made  this  love  affair, 
with  its  consequent  hates  and  jealousies, 
the  chief  motive  of  his  drama,  quite  prop- 
erly giving  it  precedence  over  her  more 
mercenary  relations  with  the  king. 

After  the  affair  with  the  pastry-cook 
came  one  with  a  hair-dresser  named  Lamat, 
which  lasted  no  longer  than  that  unfortu- 
nate gentleman's  very  short  purse.  This 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  47 


young  man,  however,  may  be  said  to  have 
left  his  mark  on  history  by  virtue  of  a  cer- 
tain style  of  hair-dressing  which  he  designed 
expressly  for  his  young  sweetheart,  and 
which  is  still  known  — 
when  known  at  all  - 
by  her  name.  After 
Lamat  had  impover- 
ished himself  through 
the  extravagance  of 
his  young  mistress  he 
fled  to  England  to  es- 
cape his  debts  while 
she  entered  a  gam- 
bling house  kept  by  a 
certain  Madame  Du- 
quesnoy  in  the  rue  dc 
Bourbon.  In  those 
days  the  fashionable 
Parisian  gambling  houses  were  much  fre- 
quented by  women,  and  were  generally 
looked  upon  as  convenient  places  of  rendez- 
vous for  the  light-minded  and  dissolute. 

Madame  Duquesnoy's  gambling  house 
serves  as  the  setting  for  the  second  act  of 
the  play,  and  a  very  notable  scene  it  is  too, 


of  njfiche  actually  used 
in  the  shop  of  Labille. 


48         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

done  entirely  in  a  peculiar  shade  of  red. 
It  is  a  shade  that  cannot  be  found  else- 
where in  this  country,  for  it  is  made  ex- 
pressly for  this  scene  in  France,  and  the 
silk  brocade  which  is  employed  for  walls, 
curtains  and  furniture  is  dyed  with  it.  It 
is  the  only  shade  of  red  that  could  be  used 
as  a  background  for  a  woman  with  such 
extraordinary  red  hair  as  that  of  Mrs. 
Carter. 

It  wras  while  frequenting  this  gaming 
house  that  Jeanette  Vaubernier  (or  Lancon, 
as  she  called  herself  now)  first  met,  in  the 
person  of  the  Count  Jean  Du  Barry,  a 
man  who  was  destined  to  play  a  most  im- 
portant part  in  the  shaping  of  her  strange 
destiny,  and  whom  Horace  Walpole,  in  his 
memoirs  of  that  period,  aptly  characterized 
as  "  a  most  consummate  blackguard."  The 
count  came  from  the  neighborhood  of  Tou- 
louse, and  always  claimed  connection  with 
the  Barry  family  who  have  resided  for 
years  in  the  south  of  Ireland,  as  well  as 
with  their  kinfolk  the  Barrymores.  He 
had  come  up  to  Paris  from  Toulouse, 
leaving  behind  him  a  wife  who  in  after 


ENTERING   UPON   HER   CAREER      51 

years  contemptuously  refused  to  accept 
any  benefit  whatever  from  the  hands  of 
either  her  husband  or  the  Favorite.  In 
Paris  the  count  succeeded  in  obtaining  a 
government  contract  for  supplying  provi- 
sions to  the  Island  of  Corsica,  and  with 
the  money  which  this  yielded  him  he  in- 
dulged his  tastes  for  gambling  and  other 
debaucheries  to  a  degree  which  soon  gained 
for  him  the  name  of  Roue. 

As  time  went  on  and  his  acquaintance 
among  men  of  wealth  and  fashion  increased, 
the  count  found  other  ways  of  earning 
money  beside  his  Corsican  contract.  One 
source  of  revenue  was  the  gambling  table, 
where  at  this  time  fortune  always  smiled 
upon  him,  and  another  was  the  traffic  in 
young  and  pretty  women,  in  which,  like 
many  another  nobleman  and  gr  ancle  dame 
of  that  corrupt  age,  he  took  part  without 
any  evidence  of  shame.  This  man  is  known 
to  have  carried  on  his  infamous  trade  as  far 
back  as  the  time  of  Madame  de  Pompadour, 
whom  he  had  sought  to  supplant  with  a 
certain  Mademoiselle  Dorothee,  the  daugh- 
ter of  a  Strasburg  water-carrier.  That  there 


52         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

was  "  money  in  the  business "  may  be 
inferred  from  the  fact  that  the  Count  Du 
Barry  had  the  effrontery  to  ask  for  him- 
self the  post  of  Minister  to  Cologne  on  the 
ground  that  it  was  he  who  had  introduced 
her  to  the  king,  and  that,  too,  without 
waiting  to  learn  if  she  had  found  favor  in 
the  royal  eyes. 

Under  the  protection  of  this  gallant  gen- 
tleman Jeanette  was  extremely  happy  for 
she  was  allowed  to  plunge  heart  and  soul 
into  the  gayest  life  that  the  French  capital 
had  to  offer.  It  was  in  the  very  midst  of 
all  this  gayety  that  something  happened 
which  she  records  at  considerable  length, 
and  which  is  presented,  in  a  somewhat  al- 
tered form,  in  the  drama.  One  day  while 
walking  in  the  street  she  was  followed  by 
a  young  man  of  distinguished  appearance, 
richly  clad,  and  with  something  peculiarly 
sombre  and  mysterious  in  his  face  which 
excited  her  curiosity.  This  young  man 
dogged  her  footsteps  for  two  or  three  days, 
until  at  last  she  turned  upon  him  and  asked 
him  what  he  meant  by  following  her. 

"  Mademoiselle,"  he  said  in  most  respect- 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  53 

ful  accents,  "  promise  to  grant  me  the  first 
reasonable  favor  I  shall  ask  of  you  when 
you  come  to  be  Queen  of  France." 

Smilingly  she  gave  the  required  promise, 
and  then  the  unknown  continued:  "You 
think  me  mad,  I  know ;  but  I  pray  you 
have  a  better  opinion  of  me.  Adieu, 
mademoiselle.  There  will  be  nothing 
more  extraordinary  after  your  elevation 
than  your  end." 

Returning  home  she  related  the  inci- 
dent to  Count  Jean,  who  was  profoundly 
impressed. 

"It  is  strange,"  he  said,  "  but  that  proph- 
ecy fits  in  with  what  has  already  come  into 
my  own  head.  Why  should  you  not  be 
queen,  —  not  the  real  queen,  of  course,  but 
as  Madame  de  Pompadour  was  ? " 

From  this  moment  the  scheme  suggested 
by  the  words  of  the  mysterious  stranger 
took  complete  possession  of  Count  Du 
Barry's  breast,  and  for  weeks  he  thought 
of  it  night  and  day,  and  planned  a  hundred 
projects  for  its  accomplishment. 

In  the  drama  this  incident  receives  due 
attention,  although  for  pictorial  purposes 


54         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

the  prophecy  is  not  made  by  the  young 
man  in  the  street  but  by  a  picturesque  old 
witch  who  comes  into  the  gaming  house  to 
tell  fortunes.  In  this  act,  too,  we  see  the 
change  that  has  taken  place  in  the  character 
of  the  young  girl  whose  roguish  follies  were 
but  yesterday  the  delight  of  her  companions 
in  the  millinery  shop,  and  a  constant  source 
of  attraction  to  the  young  men  of  fashion 
who  came  flocking  about  there.  She  is  a 
woman  now,  and  has  set  her  feet,  lightly  it 
is  true,  but  none  the  less  surely,  in  the  path 
that  she  is  to  follow  to  the  end,  and  which 
leads  direct  to  the  palace  of  Versailles. 

Under  the  tutelage  of  the  unprincipled 
Du  Barry  she  has  entered  upon  a  life  of  dis- 
sipation and  excitement  which  is  already 
beginning  to  tell  on  her,  and  from  which 
she  recoils  now  and  then  at  the  thought  of 
Cosse-Brissac. 

Compressed  into  this  scene  are  two  of  the 
crucial  events  of  her  mimic  life.  One,  his- 
torical, her  meeting  with  the  king,  and  the 
other,  invented,  her  quarrel  with  her  lover 
which  definitely  determines  her  future 
course  of  life. 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  55 

Concerning  this  gambling  house  period 
of  her  career  Madame  Du  Barry  herself 
says :  "  My  entrance  into  the  world  was 
bad ;  the  progress  of  it  was  like  the  com- 
mencement, and  I  led  a  dissipated  life." 

It  is  during  one  of  the  moments  of  re- 
flection that  come  now  and  then  to  such 
as  she  —  no  matter  how  fast  the  pace  or 
how  deep  the  cup  —  that  she  goes  back  in 
fancy  and  with  infinite  yearning  to  the  days 
when  she  wandered  through  country  lanes 
and  hedge-rows,  selling  her  little  trinkets 
to  whomever  would  buy.  The  sky  was 
blue  then,  the  grass  green,  and  the  violets, 
which  she  loved,  and  which  Cosse  gave 
her,  were  lifting  their  shy  heads  in  the 
quiet  places  in  the  woods. 

The  stranger's  prophecy  made  a  profound 
impression  on  Jean  Du  Barry.  And,  in- 
deed, the  prospect  of  supplying  an  incum- 
bent for  the  place  that  had  been  vacant  since 
the  death  of  Madame  de  Pompadour  was 
in  itself  enough  to  completely  enlist  the 
sympathy  and  interest  of  a  man  of  his 
nature. 

For  to  be  the  Favorite  of  the  King  of 


56         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

France  meant  not  merely  a  life  of  indolent 
pleasure,  but  power  far  exceeding  that 
of  any  queen  or  minister.  The  post  car- 
ried with  it  the  appointment  of  cabinets, 
the  dismissal  of  statesmen  and  generals,  the 
disposal  of  the  highest  honors  within  the 
gift  of  the  sovereign,  and  unlimited  drafts 
on  the  public  treasury.  It  is  not  easy  for 
people  of  the  present  day,  who  have  grown 
up  under  such  institutions  as  ours,  to  un- 
derstand how  the  French  nation  could  sub- 
mit year  after  year  to  such  government 
as  this. 

But  if  the  sufferings  of  the  people  were 
great,  so  was  their  vengeance,  and  the  Reign 
of  Terror  was  simply  a  natural  and  inevitable 
outcome  of  it  all,  —  the  mad  bloodthirsti- 
ness  of  a  wild  beast  which,  hunted  and  tor- 
mented beyond  all  endurance,  turns  upon 
its  pursuers  and  rends  them.  The  blood  of 
Louis  XVI  and  Marie  Antoinette  was  shed 
in  atonement  for  the  crimes  of  the  two 
reigns  that  preceded  theirs. 

Since  the  days  of  the  elegant  Pompadour 
there  had  been  no  Favorite  in  the  royal  pal- 
aces, though  it  would  have  been  hard  to 


ENTERING   UPON   HER   CAREER     59 

find  among  all  the  high-born  dames  of 
France  a  single  one  with  any  pretensions 
whatever  to  youth  and  beauty  who  did  not 
aspire  to  the  post.  Many  there  were,  in- 
deed, whose  claims  were  artfully  pressed 
by  near  relatives  or  mercenary  intermedi- 
aries ;  but  the  king,  who  was  by  this  time 
nearly  threescore  years  of  age,  and  had  run 
the  whole  gamut  of  pleasure  and  dissipation, 
would  have  none  of  them.  By  nature 
morose  and  "  unamusable,"  as  Talleyrand 
said  of  the  first  Napoleon,  as  years  went  by 
he  grew  more  and  more  difficult  to  enter- 
tain. Madame  de  Pompadour  had  been  a 
woman  of  wit,  beauty,  and  talent.  A  con- 
summate actress  behind  as  well  as  before 
the  footlights,  she  had  not  only  made  her 
way  skilfully  among  the  grand  ladies  of  the 
court,  but  had  also  organized  the  theatre  of 
the  Petits  Cabinets,  in  which  she  was  wont 
to  entertain  the  king,  taking  the  leading 
part  herself  and  choosing  her  supporting 
company  from  among  the  ranks  of  the 
higher  nobility. 

These  performances  were  usually  given 
to  an  audience  of  not  more  than  twoscore, 


60         THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

and  so  great  was  the  fame  that  attached 
itself  to  them,  that  ambassadors  and  cabinet 
ministers  considered  it  an  honor  to  be  in- 
vited to  take  even  the  smallest  part  in  the 
representation. 

Madame  de  Pompadour,  moreover,  was 
a  woman  of  genuine  artistic  temperament, 
and  one  thoroughly  in  touch  with  the  spirit 
of  her  luxurious,  richly  decorative  age. 
AVith  her  own  hands  she  engraved  nu- 
merous portraits  of  her  royal  lover  and 
did  much  to  develop  the  manufacture  of 
Sevres  porcelain,  which  was  begun  during 
her  reign. 

Jeanette  Vaubernier,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  merely  an  unlettered  Parisian  grisette 
who  had  been  transplanted  from  behind 
the  counter  of  the  milliner  shop,  where 
she  had  bloomed  like  a  fragrant,  healthy 
carnation,  to  the  hot-house  atmosphere 
of  a  gambling  house,  where,  among  the 
painted  and  wrinkled  and  world-worn  habi- 
tues, she  seemed  like  an  exotic  of  rare 
beauty  and  exquisitely  fresh  charm.  In 
the  ways  of  court  life  she  had  had  abso- 
lutely no  experience,  and  she  herself  laughed 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  61 


in  unaffected  merriment  at  the  mere  idea 
of  filling  the  place  of  the  gifted  and  beau- 
tiful Pompadour. 

Nevertheless  the  day  came  when  Count 
Du  Barry  entered  her  apartment  radiant 
with  delight,  and  informed  her 
that  their  dinner-table  that 
night  was  to  be  graced  by  no 
less  a  person  than  that  widely 
known  and  infamous  creature 
of  Louis  XV  called  Lebel. 

Now  Label's  nominal  posi- 
tion at  court  was  merely  that 
of  valet  de  chambre  to  the  king ; 
but  there  was  no  man  in  the 
royal  service  who  was  more  diligently 
courted  by  men  and  women  of  position 
than  this  same  Lebel,  and  for  no  other 
reason  save  that  it  was  generally  known 
that  he  commanded  all  the  approaches 
through  which  a  woman  might  hope  to 
reach  the  much  coveted  place  of  Favorite. 

As  it  was  necessary  that  the  place  should 
be  filled  by  a  married  woman,  it  was  agreed 
that  Jeanette  should  be  presented  to  Lebel 
as  the  wife  of  Jean's  brother  Guillaume, 


The  corset  of 
the  period. 


62         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

who  still  had  his  home  in  the  country.  So 
much  excited  was  the  count  over  their 
good  fortune  in  securing  a  guest  of  such 
distinction  that  he  assumed  personal  charge 
of  Jeanette's  toilette,  as  well  as  of  the  din- 
ner, and  for  two  hours  he  divided  his  time 
between  her  dressing-room  and  the  kitchen, 
to  the  despair  of  both  cook  and  hair-dresser. 
He  had  his  reward,  however,  for  Lebel  was 
conquered  by  the  first  smiling  glance  of  his 
hostess,  and  to  the  count's  question,  "  What 
think  you  of  our  new  beauty  ? "  he  made 
answer,  as  he  raised  her  hand  to  his  lips : 
"  She  is  worthy  of  the  throne." 

The  company  sat  down  to  dinner,  and 
the  king's  valet  de  chambre  was  so  warm 
in  his  praise  that  the  count  began  to  fear 
that  he  had  fallen  in  love  with  Jeanette 
himself,  and  would  refuse  to  resign  her  to 
any  one  else. 

Two  days  after  the  dinner  the  king's 
valet  de  chambre  called  again  and,  finding 
Jeanette  alone,  talked  to  her  quite  seriously 
of  her  personal  charms  and  of  the  part 
which  a  woman  like  herself  might  assume 
under  the  conditions  then  exis'ting  in  France. 


ENTERING   UPON   HER   CAREER     63 

"  Fearing  to  compromise  myself,"  relates 
Madame  Du  Barry,  "  I  made  no  reply,  but 
maintained  the  reserve  which  my  character 
imposed  upon  me.  I  saw  that  he  really 
thought  me  the  sister-in-law  of  Count  Jean, 
and  I  left  him  in  all  his  error,  which  was  ma- 
terial to  my  interests.  I  am  not  clever,  my 
friends ;  I  never  could  conduct  an  intrigue. 
I  feared  to  speak  or  do  wrong ;  and,  whilst  I 
kept  a  tranquil  appearance,  I  was  internally 
agitated  at  the  absence  of  Count  Jean. 

"  Fortune  sent  him  to  me.  He  was 
crossing  the  street  when  he  saw  at  our  door 
a  carriage  with  the  royal  livery,  which 
Lebel  always  used  when  his  affairs  did  not 
demand  a  positive  incognito.  This  equi- 
page made  him  suspect  a  visit  from  Lebel 
and  he  came  in  opportunely  to  extricate 
me  from  my  embarrassment. 

"  *  Sir,'  said  Lebel  to  him,  when  he  en- 
tered, *  here  is  the  lady  whose  extreme 
modesty  refuses  to  listen  to  what  I  dare  not 
thus  explain  to  her.' 

"  '  Is  it  anything  I  may  hear  for  her  ? ' 
said  the  count,  with  a  smiling  air. 

"  *  Yes,  I  am  the  ambassador  of  a  mighty 


64 

power ;  you  are  the  minister  plenipoten- 
tiary of  the  lady,  and  with  your  leave  we 
will  go  into  your  private  room  to  discuss 
the  articles  of  the  secret  treaty  which  I 
have  been  charged  to  propose  to  you. 
What  says  madame  ? ' 

" '  I  consent  to  anything  that  can  come 
from  such  an  ambassador,'  was  my  answer, 
and  thereupon  Count  Jean  led  him  into 
another  room." 

In  this  private  interview  the  ambassador 
informed  the  plenipotentiary  that  the  king 
had  become  deeply  interested  in  the  de- 
scription he  had  given  to  him  of  the 
charms  of  the  ravishing  Madame  Du  Barry, 
and  that  he  desired  an  interview  with  her 
in  order  that  he  might  himself  be  the 
judge  of  her  beauty. 

The  count,  naturally  enough,  was  agree- 
able to  this  proposal,  and  Lebel  continued, 
saying  that  he  intended  to  entertain  the 
king  and  several  of  his  court,  including 
the  famous  Due  de  Richelieu,  at  supper 
the  following  evening.  He  had  promised 
His  Majesty  that  Madame  Du  Barry  should 
be  one  of  the  party. 


a 


ENTERING   UPON   HER   CAREER     67 

The  count  eagerly  accepted,  in  the 
name  of  his  supposed  sister-in-law,  the 
valet's  invitation,  and  no  sooner  had  the  car- 
riage with  the  royal  liveries  rolled  away 
than  he  hastened  to  the  room  where  the 
one-time  sweetheart  of  Nicolas  the  pastry- 
cook sat  waiting  to  learn  the  results  of  the 
interview,  her  brain  dazzled  at  the  mere 
thought  of  becoming  the  mistress  of  His 
Most  Christian  Majesty,  Louis  XV. 

"  Victory  ! "  cried  the  count,  delightedly 
as  he  entered  the  chamber.  "  Victory,  my 
dear  Jeanette  !  To-morrow  you  sup  with 
the  king ! " 

And  on  receipt  of  this  information,  we 
learn  that  dear  Jeanette  turned  pale,  lost 
her  strength  completely  and  was  compelled 
to  sit,  or  rather  to  fall  into  a  convenient 
chair.  When  she  had  recovered  a  little, 
Count  Jean  told  her  of  his  interview  with 
Lebel,  and  advised  her  as  to  the  course  that 
she  should  follow  should  she  become  the 
Favorite  of  the  king. 

"  To-morrow  you  will  be  everything  1 " 
he  cried  with  energy  ;  "  but  we  must  think 
about  this  morrow.  Make  haste,  noble 


68         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

countess.  Go  to  all  the  milliners  —  seek 
what  is  elegant,  rather  than  what  is  rich. 
Be  as  lovely,  pleasing,  and  gay  as  possible  ; 
this  is  the  main  point  —  and  God  will  do 
all  the  rest." 

Late  on  the  following  day,  the  Du  Barrys 
presented  themselves  at  Versailles,  and  were 
eagerly  received  by  Label,  who  came  for- 
ward, saying :  "  Ah,  madame,  I  began  to 
fear  you  might  not  come.  You  have  been 
looked  for  with  an  impatience  - 

"  Which  can  hardly  equal  mine,"  inter- 
rupted Madame  Du  Barry  ;  "for  you  were 
prepared  for  your  visitor,  whilst  I  am  yet 
to  learn  who  is  the  friend  that  so  kindly 
desires  to  see  me." 

"  It  is  better  that  it  should  be  so,"  added 
Lebel.  "  Do  not  seek  either  to  guess  or 
discover  more  than  that  you  will  here  meet 
with  some  cheerful  society, — friends  of  mine 
who  will  sup  at  my  house,  but  with  whom 
circumstances  prevent  my  sitting  down  at 
table." 

"  How  ! "  she  exclaimed  with  affected 
surprise.  "Not  sup  with  us  ? " 

"  Even  so,"  replied  Lebel,  and  then  added, 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  69 

with  a  laugh,  "he  and  I  sit  down  to  sup- 
per together !  What  an  idea !  No,  you 
will  find  that  just  as  the  guests  are  about 
to  sit  down  at  table  I  shall  be  suddenly 
called  out  of  the  room,  and  shall  only 
return  at  the  close  of  the  repast." 

Had  Jeanette  Du  Barry  been  a  woman 
of  greater  experience  in  the  ways  of  the 
polite  world,  it  is  not  at  all  unlikely  that  her 
history  would  never  have  been  written,  and 
that  her  acquaintance  with  royalty  would 
have  begun  and  ended  at  the  little  supper 
in  which  Louis  XV  bore  the  title  of  the 
Baron  de  Gonesse,  and  at  which  no  cover 
was  laid  for  the  plebeian  host.  If  there 
was  one  moment  in  her  life  in  which  she  de- 
serves praise,  —  and,  to  do  her  justice,  there 
were  many,  —  it  was  this  one  of  such  great 
importance  to  her.  Instead  of  endeavor- 
ing to  charm  the  man  whom  she  knew  to 
be  her  king  by  imitating  the  airs,  graces, 
and  affectations  of  a  society  with  which  he 
had  long  been  surfeited,  instead  of  simulat- 
ing the  embarrassment  to  which  every 
woman  resorted  as  a  sort  of  tribute  of 
homage  to  royalty,  she  had  the  good  sense 


70         THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

to  remain  her  own  simple,  natural  self. 
Not  for  years  had  the  worn-out  monarch 
met  a  woman  with  such  hoydenish  exuber- 
ance of  spirit,  such  beauty  of  face  and 
form,  such  bright,  lively  chatter.  With  him 
it  proved  a  case  of  love  at  first  sight. 

On  her  return  to  Paris  the  next  day 
Jeanette  received  from  him  a  magnificent 
diamond  aigrette,  worth  at  least  sixty 
thousand  francs,  and  the  sum  of  two  hun- 
dred thousand  francs  in  bank-notes.  Both 
she  and  Count  Jean  were  well-nigh  struck 
dumb  with  astonishment  at  the  sight  of 
these  treasures,  which,  so  the  record  runs, 
he  divided  into  two  equal  parts,  putting 
one  into  his  own  pocket,  and  the  other  into 
the  escritoire  of  his  soi-disant  sister-in-law. 
And  she  in  her  turn  bestowed  a  large  dou- 
ceur upon  Henriette,  her  faithful  maid,  and 
before  nightfall  contrived  to  squander  at 
least  one-quarter  of  her  share  on  all  sorts  of 
beautiful  but  unnecessary  trifles. 

It  is  recorded  also  that  that  evening  she 
and  the  Count  Jean  sat  late  in  grave  coun- 
cil. The  different  ministers  and  generals 
passed  in  review  before  them,  to  be  retained 


ENTERING  UPON  HER  CAREER  71 

or  dismissed  as  they  thought  best ;  new 
schemes  of  taxation  —  Heaven  knows  the 
people  were  taxed  beyond  all  endurance 
then !  — were  seriously  discussed,  —  in  short, 
they  began  in  idea  to  act  as  if  sovereign 
power  in  France  had  already  been  bestowed 
upon  the  new  Favorite. 

"After  all,"  said  Jeanette  Du  Barry,  "  the 
world  is  but  an  amusing  theatre,  and  I  see 
no  reason  why  a  pretty  woman  should  not 
play  a  pretty  part  in  it." 


CHAPTER   IV 

A   NEW  SUN   ON  THE  HORIZON   OF 
VERSAILLES 

HE  next  day  Madame 
Du  Barry  repaired  again 
to  Versailles,  where  the 
king  was  awaiting  her 
with  such  impatience 
that  he  hastened  to 
greet  her  while  she  was 
still  at  her  dressing  table  completing  her 
toilet.  She  was  installed  at  once  in  a 
splendid  apartment,  attended  by  obsequious 
serving  women,  and  from  that  moment 
had  a  regular  establishment  of  attendants 
appointed  for  her  special  use. 

That  night,  as  the  two  sat  in  conver- 
sation over  the  supper-table,  the  king 
informed  his  new  mistress,  with  a  degree 
of  fervor  that  left  no  shadow  of  doubt  in 


A   NEW  SUN   ON  THE   HORIZON    75 

her  mind,  that  she  was  now  no  longer  an 
obscure,  friendless  woman,  but  a  personage 
very,  very  dear  to  the  heart  of  the  sovereign 
of  France.  To  use  the  exact  expression  of 
Lebel,  she  was  "the  new  sun  which  had 
arisen  to  illumine  the  horizon  of  Versailles." 

The  Due  de  Richelieu  lost  no  time  in 
doing  homage  to  her,  and  brought  with 
him  the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  at  that  time  one 
of  the  most  powerful  nobles  in  France. 
Moreover,  women  of  fashion  solicited  places 
about  her  person,  among  them  a  certain 
Madame  Saint  Benoit,  who  became  first 
lady  of  the  bed-chamber,  and  remained  with 
her  during  the  whole  period  of  her  reign, 
her  former  maid,  the  faithful  and  beloved 
Henriette,  contenting  herself  with  the 
second  place  of  honor. 

A  few  days  after  the  installation  of  the 
new  Favorite,  Lebel  died  in  such  a  sudden 
manner  that  many  believed  him  to  have 
been  poisoned.  This  was  probably  not  the 
case,  but  it  is  certain  that  he  became 
alarmed  at  the  king's  infatuation  for  his 
new  mistress,  and  took  it  upon  himself  to 
explain  to  the  monarch  that  she  was  not 


76         THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

worthy  of  his  regard  ;  that  she  was  not  of 
noble  or  even  of  decent  birth,  and  that  she 
had  lied  in  representing  herself  to  be  a 
married  woman,  whereas  she  was  merely 
the  latest  sweetheart  of  Count  Du  Barry. 
So  incensed  did  King  Louis  become  at  this 
frankness  on  the  part  of  his  faithful  ser- 
vitor that  he  actually  threatened  him  with 
a  pair  of  tongs  and  drove  him  from  his 
presence,  bidding  him  see  that  the  lady 
was  supplied  with  a  husband  without  de- 
lay. It  is  not  improbable  that  the  excite- 
ment of  this  interview  had  much  to  do 
with  Lebel's  sudden  death,  but  he  lived 
long  enough  to  transmit  his  sovereign's  last 
command  to  Count  Du  Barry,  and  he,  in 
his  turn,  hastened  to  write  to  his  brother 
Guillaume,  a  young  officer  who  was  living 
at  the  family  home  in  Toulouse,  and  ap- 
prised him  of  the  brilliant  marriage  which 
he  had  arranged  for  him. 

Guillaume,  who  seems  to  have  shared  his 
elder  brother's  willingness  to  do  anything 
that  was  likely  to  augment  his  revenues, 
hastened  to  Paris,  bringing  with  him  the 
power  of  attorney  by  which  his  mother 


A   NEW  SUN   ON  THE   HORIZON    77 

authorized  him,  in  accordance  with  French 
law,  to  contract  marriage  with  such  person 
as  he  might  think  fitting.  The  contract  of 
marriage  was  immediately 
prepared,  but  it  was  deemed 
politic  to  delay  the  cere- 
mony for  a  short  time 
in  order  that 
a  new  certificate 
of  birth,  less  shameful  than 
the  real  one  quoted  on  a 
previous  page,  could  be 
forged  and  substituted. 

In     this     document, 
which,    with   the    conni- 
vance of  persons  high  in 
power,  was  actually  en- 
tered  in    the   baptismal 
register  of  the  parish  of 

_  r  .  Orange  woman. 

Vaucouleurs,  Jeanette  is 
described  as  the  daughter  of  Jean  Jacques 
Gomard   de  Vaubernier  and  Anne  Becu, 
called  Quantigny,  and  three  years  are  taken 
from  her  age. 

These  arrangements  having  been  made, 
the  contract  was  duly  drawn  up  and  signed, 


78         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

and  on  the  first  of  September  the  marriage 
was  celebrated.  Immediately  after  the 
ceremony,  the  husband  returned  to  Tou- 
louse, and  there  is  every  reason  to  believe 
that  he  went  with  well-filled  pockets.  Per- 
sons of  his  class  did  not  do  business  merely 
for  the  sake  of  their  health  in  those  days. 
As  for  the  bride,  she  returned  to  Versailles 
and  took  possession  of  Lebel's  quarters, 
moving  from  them  a  short  time  later  to  the 
apartment  that  had  just  been  vacated  by 
the  Princess  Adelaide.  These  rooms  were 
situated  in  the  second  story,  conveniently 
near  the  apartments  of  the  king,  who  could 
pass  from  one  to  the  other  without  being 
seen.  During  the  remainder  of  the  year 
1768  the  liaison  was  conducted  in  strict 
privacy,  as  the  king  was  in  deep  mourning 
for  the  queen,  who  had  recently  died,  and 
French  etiquette  forbade  any  public  dem- 
onstration of  affection  until  the  end  of  a 
fitting  period  of  grief. 

That  Louis  XV  was  from  the  very  first 
thoroughly  infatuated  with  Jeanette  Du 
Barry  there  can  be  no  doubt.  He  loaded 
her  with  presents,  allowed  her  to  make  un- 


A   NEW   SUN  ON   THE   HORIZON    79 

limited  drafts  on  his  treasury,  and  cham- 
pioned her  cause  in  the  many  vexatious 
quarrels  which  the  jealousy  of  the  other 
courtiers  forced  upon  her. 

"  How  you  all  must  have  hated  me  in 
those  days,"  she  said,  years  after  the  king's 
death,  while  speaking  to  one  of  the  great 
princesses  of  the  realm. 

"Not  at  all,  my  dear,"  was  the  amiable 
reply.  "  It  was  not  that  we  hated  you,  but 
that  we  all  wanted  your  place." 

Jeanette  Du  Barry  must  have  been  a 
consummate  actress,  for  while  she  was 
simulating  an  ardor  for  her  lover  that 
seemed  fully  as  great  as  his  own  for  her, 
she  kept  her  senses  about  her  to  a  degree 
that  enabled  her  to  make  an  estimate  of 
his  character  that  is  well  worth  recording 
here.  Nor  does  it  read  at  all  like  the 
rhapsody  of  a  love-sick  young  woman. 

"  Louis  XV,  King  of  France,  was  one 
of  those  sentimental  egotists  who  believed 
he  loved  the  whole  world,  his  subjects,  and 
his  family ;  whilst  in  reality  the  sole  en- 
grossing object  was  self.  Gifted  with  many 
personal  and  intellectual  endowments  which 


80         THE   STORY    OF   DU   BARRY 

might  have  disputed  the  palm  with  the 
most  notable  personages  of  the  court,  he 
was  nevertheless  devoured  by  ennui,  which, 
by  the  way,  he  regarded  as  one  of  the 
necessary  accompaniments  of  royalty.  De- 
void of  taste  in  literary  matters,  he  despised 
all  connected  with  belles-lettres  and  es- 
teemed men  only  in  proportion  to  the 
number  and  richness  of  their  armorial  bear- 
ings. With  him,  M.  de  Voltaire  ranked 
beneath  the  lowest  country  squire,  and  the 
very  mention  of  a  man  of  letters  was  terri- 
fying to  his  imagination,  because  it  dis- 
turbed the  current  of  his  own  ideas. 

"  He  revelled  in  the  plenitude  of  power, 
yet  felt  dissatisfied  with  the  mere  title  of 
king.  He  ardently  desired  to  win  renown 
as  the  first  general  of  the  age,  and  enter- 
tained the  utmost  jealousy  of  Frederick  II 
of  Prussia  of  whose  exploits  he  spoke  with 
undisguised  spleen  and  ill-humor.  The 
habit  of  commanding,  and  the  prompt 
obedience  he  had  always  met  with  had 
long  since  palled  upon  his  mind,  and  he 
cared  nothing  for  what  was  so  easily  ob- 
tained. This  satiety  and  listlessness  were 


In  Comedy  Vein. 


A   NEW   SUN   ON   THE   HORIZON     83 

by  many  attributed  to  a  melancholy  dis- 
position. He  disliked  any  appearance  of 
opposition  to  his  will,  not  that  he  particu- 
larly resented  the  opposition,  but  that  he 
knew  his  own  weakness,  and  feared  lest  he 
should  be  compelled  to  make  a  show  of 
a  firmness  which  he  knew  he  did  not 
possess. 

"  For  the  clergy  he  entertained  the  most 
superstitious  veneration,  and  he  feared  God 
because  he  had  a  greater  dread  of  the  devil. 
In  the  hands  of  his  confessor  he  believed 
was  lodged  absolute  power  to  confer  upon 
him  the  unlimited  license  to  commit  any 
and  every  sin.  He  greatly  dreaded  pam- 
phlets, satires,  epigrams,  and  the  opinion  of 
posterity,  and  yet  his  conduct  was  that  of 
a  man  who  scoffs  at  the  world's  judgment." 

There  is  much  truth  in  this  intimate  por- 
trait of  the  man  who,  for  nearly  sixty  years, 
was  the  constitutional  ruler  of  France.  No 
woman  could  have  found  a  more  powerful 
protector  than  he  was  ;  but  his  very  power 
made  the  recipient  of  his  favor  a  person  to 
be  hated,  envied,  and  intrigued  against  by 
the  other  factions  in  the  court. 


84         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

So  it  happened  that  while  there  were 
many  who,  like  the  Due  de  Richelieu, 
sought  to  ingratiate  themselves  with  the 
Favorite,  and  to  warm  themselves  in  the 
rays  of  the  new  sun  that  had  arisen  on 
the  horizon  of  Versailles,  there  were  others 
who  ranged  themselves  against  her  in  open 
or  secret  hostility.  Chief  among  these 
were  the  then  prime  minister,  the  Due  de 
Choiseul,  and  his  sister,  the  Duchesse  de 
Grammont.  Between  this  powerful  couple 
and  the  Favorite  there  was  carried  on  a 
war  which  eventually  brought  about  the 
dismissal  of  the  prime  minister  from  office, 
and  ceased  only  with  the  death  of  the  king 
and  the  downfall  of  his  mistress. 

The  real  cause  of  this  enmity  may  be 
traced  to  the  endeavors  of  the  duchess, 
aided  by  her  powerful  brother,  to  obtain  a 
mastery  over  the  king,  and  secure  for  her- 
self the  post  which  had  been  vacant  since 
the  days  of  La  Pompadour.  In  further- 
ance of  this  excellent  project,  the  Due  de 
Choiseul  had  exercised  eternal  vigilance  in 
regard  to  the  moral  welfare  of  the  king, 
and  had  taken  pains  to  nip  in  the  bud  any 


A    NEW   SUN   ON   THE   HORIZON     85 

indication  of  a  passion  that  seemed  likely 
to  be  lasting  or  serious. 

On  one  occasion,  about  a  year  after 
Madame  de  Pompadour's  death,  an  attempt 
was  made  by  a  court  faction  hostile  to  his 
own  to  install  in  the  vacant  place  a  young 
woman  named  Mademoiselle  d'Esparbes, 
who  had  the  most  beautiful  hands  in  Ver- 
sailles, and  who  had  charmed  the  aesthetic 
fancy  of  the  sovereign  by  the  dainty  grace 
with  which  she  employed  her  slender,  beau- 
tiful fingers  in  picking  cherries.  She  had 
already  been  honored  with  a  suite  of  apart- 
ments at  Marly,  and  all  seemed  to  be  going 
well,  when  Monsieur  de  Choiseul,  who  had 
been  patiently  biding  his  time,  stopped  her 
one  day  on  the  grand  staircase,  and,  in  the 
presence  of  the  whole  court,  chucked  her 
under  the  chin  and  said  brutally  :  "  How 
is  your  business  going  on,  my  girl  ? " 

These  words  literally  killed  the  whole 
scheme,  for  after  this  open  affront  the 
king,  whose  interest  in  the  woman  was 
very  slight,  did  not  deem  it  prudent  to  go 
any  further,  and  a  few  days  later  her  apart- 
ment was  taken  away  from  her,  and  she 


86         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

herself  received  a  letter  under  the  royal 
seal,  exempting  her  from  paying  court  to 
the  king,  and  commanding  her  to  retire  to 
the  home  of  her  father,  the  Marquis  de 
Lussan,  at  Montauban. 

After  this  episode  the  Due  de  Choiseul 
felt  tolerably  sure  that  his  own  place  was 
secure,  and  that  it  might  be  possible  for  him 
to  install  his  sister  in  the  place  that  she 
coveted.  But  Louis  XV  was  tired  of  the 
government  of  political  women.  He  had 
had  enough  of  that  sort  of  thing  during 
the  Pompadour  reign,  and  had  long  since 
declared  that  no  earthly  power  would 
induce  him  to  take  a  mistress  from  the 
ranks  of  the  nobility.  But  in  spite  of  his 
increasing  coldness  toward  her,  the  duchess 
continued  in  her  efforts  to  charm  him  in  a 
manner  so  open  as  to  excite  the  raillery  of 
the  entire  court  circle. 

The  intrigue  with  Du  Barry,  she  and  her 
brother  at  first  regarded  with  contempt. 
They  thought  that  they  saw  in  it  the  cun- 
ning handiwork  of  their  natural  enemy, 
Richelieu.  And  so  both  of  them  held 
aloof  from  the  newcomer.  Very  soon, 


A   NEW   SUN   ON  THE   HORIZON    87 

however,  the  prime  minister  realized  that 
a  new  power  had  arisen  that  might,  in  the 
end,  prove  a  formidable  rival  to  his  own. 
He  saw  that  he  had  no  longer  to  deal 
with  a  passing  caprice  on  the  part  of  the 
king,  but  with  a  passion  that  had  taken  a 
strong  hold  on  the  royal  heart  and  was 
growing  stronger,  instead  of  weaker,  every 
day. 

It  was  a  serious  discovery  for  him,  but 
to  his  proud  sister,  who  saw  the  place  that 
she  had  coveted  for  herself  filled  by  a  mere 
waif  from  a  milliner  shop,  it  was  maddening 
beyond  her  powers  of  endurance. 

In  a  rage,  she  stirred  her  brother  on  to 
open  hostilities,  and  made  war  herself  by 
means  of  pamphlets,  street  ballads,  vulgar 
verses  and  satirical  newspaper  articles.  She 
raked  up  the  past  life  of  the  Favorite, 
spiced  it  liberally  with  her  own  imagina- 
tion, —  which  appears  to  have  been  not  over 
clean,  —  and  had  it  set  to  music  under  the 
name  of  "  La  Bourbonnaise."  She  even 
imbued  Voltaire,  who  had  always  been  an 
ally  of  her  brother,  with  the  idea  for  the 
pamphlet,  "  The  King  of  Bedlam,"  in  which 


88        THE   STORY    OF   DU   BARRY 

his  wit  passed  over  Madame  Du  Barry  and 
found  a  target  in  the  king  himself. 

Fully  as  bitter  in  their  hostilities  as  the 
Duchesse  de  Grammont,  although  they  did 
not  deign  to  show  it  as  she  did,  were  the 
royal  princesses,  the  daughters  of  the  king. 
This  is  scarcely  to  be  wondered  at,  espe- 
cially when  we  consider  the  recent  death 
of  their  mother.  Nor  is  it  surprising  to 
learn  that  these  ladies  united  in  vigorous 
remonstrance  when  their  father  appro- 
priated for  the  use  of  his  new  love  the 
apartments  which  belonged  to  his  daughter, 
the  Princess  Adelaide. 

That  Madame  I3u  Barry  was  able  to 
stem  the  tide  of  opposition  that  was  raised 
against  her  during  the  early  part  of  her 
reign,  seems  little  short  of  marvellous  when 
we  consider  her  low  origin,  previous  man- 
ner of  life,  and  utter  inexperience  in  the 
ways  of  a  royal  court.  Her  success,  though 
due  largely  to  her  own  good  sense  and 
good  nature,  probably  owed  a  good  deal  to 
the  constant  care  with  which  her  brother- 
in-law,  Count  Jean,  watched  over  her  from 
his  home  in  Paris,  and  gave  her  counsel 


A   NEW   SUN   ON  THE   HORIZON    91 


that  helped  her  over  every  difficulty  she 
encountered.  Although  thoroughly  de- 
based, he  was  nevertheless  a  man  of  talent 
and  energy,  and  he  knew  too,  that  the 
services  which  he  could 
render  his  former  mis- 
tress, who  in  her  new 
life  could  not  distinguish 
friend  from  enemy,  were 
of  such  value  that  she 
could  well  afford  to  pay 
him  handsomely  for 
them. 

Between 
Versailles 
and  Paris  a 
corps  of  mes- 
sengers was 
in  continual 
service,  car- 
rying from 
MadameDu 
Barry  letters 
of  inquiry 
regarding 

CV  en        t  n  e          Objects  seen  in  the  milliner's  shop. 


92         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

smallest  details  and  bringing  in  return  the 
most  explicit  and  minute  instructions  from 
her  crafty  and  experienced  brother-in-law. 

It  is  doubtful  if  the  actress  ever  studied 
the  great  part  in  which  she  has  won  such 
signal  triumphs  on  the  mimic  scene  any 
more  conscientiously  and  carefully  than 
this  young  shop-girl  did  that  of  the  extraor- 
dinary one  that  she  was  called  upon  to 
play  at  such  short  notice  and  with  so  little 
experience.  Certainly  both  women  were 
supremely  fortunate  in  the  matter  of  a 
stage  director. 

So  well  did  the  king's  Favorite  follow 
the  instructions  of  her  director,  so  much 
native  aptitude  did  she  display  for  her  call- 
ing, that  during  the  critical  year  which 
elapsed  between  her  first  meeting  with  the 
king  and  her  formal  presentation  at  court 
she  did  not  once  gratify  her  enemies  by 
making  herself  ridiculous. 

Moreover,  she  had  found  time  and  oppor- 
tunity to  strengthen  her  claims  to  a  like 
recognition  by  means  of  a  none  too  accu- 
rate genealogy  of  the  Du  Barry  family, 
which  had  been  prepared  in  England,  under 


A  New  Fancy, 


A   NEW   SUN   ON  THE   HORIZON    93 

the  inspiration  of  the  same  brain  that  had 
conceived  the  idea  of  the  false  baptismal 
entry,  and  claiming  for  the  Du  Barry's 
blood-kinship  with  the  famous  Irish  family 
of  Barrymore.  She  had  also  obtained  from 
the  hand  of  her  former  lover  some  pam- 
phlets reflecting  on  the  character  of  her 
arch  enemies,  the  Duchesse  de  Grammont 
and  her  brother  the  Due  de  Choiseul. 


PRESENTED   AT   COURT 

ER  position  in  the  per- 
sonal regard  of  the  king 
having  become  secure, 
the  Favorite's  next  step 
was  to  secure  the  much- 
coveted  and  all-impor- 
tant honor  of  a  formal 
presentation  at  his  court.  And  in  this, 
as  in  all  other  matters  affecting  her  inter- 
ests, she  received  the  support  and  counsel 
of  her  brother-in-law. 

To  a  woman  in  her  anomalous  position, 
this  formal  presentation  at  court  was  a 
matter  of  vital  importance.  Without  it  she 
was  merely  the  king's  mistress,  the  fancy 
of  a  passing  moment,  and,  like  others  who 
hang  on  princes'  favor,  liable  to  be  set 
aside  the  very  instant  that  a  fresh  face 
found  favor  in  the  royal  eyes. 


PRESENTED  AT  COURT  95 

Once  presented  at  court,  however,  she 
had  the  right  to  live  openly  in  the  palace 
of  her  sovereign,  to  take  her  place  in  the 
world  as  a  woman  whose  position  in  soci- 
ety was  assured,  to  entertain  ambassadors, 
statesmen  and  generals,  give  orders  to  the 
ministers,  —  in  short,  to  have  a  voice  in  all 
matters  of  state. 

From  the  very  first  Jean  Du  Barry  had 
urged  her  not  to  cease  in  her  efforts  to 
secure  for  herself  this  distinction.  He 
knew  far  better  than  she  did  how  much  it 
meant  to  a  woman  playing  such  a  fascinat- 
ing and  hazardous  game  as  the  one  in  which 
she  had  taken  a  hand.  When  she  seemed 
content  with  liberal  presents  of  money  and 
jewelry,  when  she  expressed  perfect  confi- 
dence in  the  continuance  of  royal  favor, 
simply  because  she  found  herself  lodged  in 
apartments  that  communicated  easily  with 
those  of  the  king,  it  was  Jean  Du  Barry 
who  spurred  her  on  to  fresh  exertions  by 
showing  her  that  all  this  meant  no  more 
than  the  capricious  love  of  a  man  who  had 
been  lavishing  money  and  diamonds  on 
women  all  his  life. 


96         THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

Of  course ,  this  presentation  was  opposed 
by  a  very  strong  court  faction.  The  pow- 
erful Due  de  Choiseul  sought  in  every 
possible  way  to  prevent  it,  as  did  his  sister, 
the  Duchesse  de  Grammont.  The  daugh- 
ters of  the  king,  who  had  been  inexpressi- 
bly mortified  by  their  father's  open  lack  of 
respect  for  the  memory  of  his  dead  queen, 
were  no  less  bitter  in  their  opposition,  and 
in  their  efforts  they  found  many  powerful 
allies  in  the  most  exalted  court  circles. 
These  and  other  persons  of  the  highest 
importance  formed  what  seemed  like  an 
impenetrable  wall  about  the  throne  of 
France.  So  great  indeed  was  the  opposi- 
tion from  within  the  ranks  of  his  own  fam- 
ily, as  well  as  from  those  of  his  advisers, 
that  the  king,  who  seems  to  have  had  rare 
skill  in  the  difficult  art  of  keeping  out  of 
family  rows,  summoned  his  grand  almoner, 
Monsieur  de  Vauguyon,  and  addressed  him 
as  follows  :  "  La  Vauguyon,  you  are  a  man 
of  a  thousand.  Listen  attentively  to  me. 
I  wish  much  that  the  Countess  Du  Barry 
should  be  presented  ;  I  wish  it,  and  that 
too  in  defiance  of  all  that  can  be  said  and 


PRESENTED   AT  COURT  99 

done.  My  indignation  is  excited  before- 
hand against  all  those  who  shall  raise  any 
obstacle  to  it.  Do  not  fail  to  let  my 
daughters  know  that  if  they  do  not  comply 
with  my  wishes,  I  will  let  my  anger  fall 
heavily  on  all  persons  by  whose  counsels 
they  may  be  persuaded ;  for  I  only  am 
master  and  I  will  prove  it  to  the  last. 
These  are  your  credentials,  my  dear  duke, 
add  to  them  what  you  may  think  fitting. 
I  will  bear  you  out  in  anything." 

The  prelate  undertook  this  delicate  com- 
mission, having  first  obtained  from  Madame 
Du  Barry  her  promise  that  the  weight  of 
her  influence  would  at  all  times  be  thrown 
in  favor  of  the  clerical  party,  to  which  he  of 
course  belonged,  and  not  with  their  natural 
enemies,  the  philosophers  or  free-thinkers. 

Armed  with  this  assurance,  he  soon  ob- 
tained from  Madame  Louise,  the  most  pious 
and  obedient  of  the  king's  daughters,  her 
promise  that  she  would  yield  to  her  father's 
wishes.  The  princesses  Sophie,  Adelaide, 
and  Victoire  he  found  less  complacent,  and 
it  was  only  by  the  exercise  on  his  part  of 
the  most  adroit  diplomacy  and  the  most 


100       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

convincing  and  pious  eloquence  that  he 
succeeded  in  persuading  them  that  it  was 
their  duty,  as  daughters  of  the  king,  to 
set  an  example  in  obedience.  Finally  the 
four  sisters  met  at  the  house  of  Madame 
Adelaide  and  decided  that  as  the  king  had 
expressed  himself  so  positively  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  presentation  they  would  receive 
his  mistress  with  every  mark  of  courtesy. 

The  almoner  hastened  to  Madame  Du 
Barry  and  informed  her  of  his  success. 
Her  joy  was  so  great  that  she  embraced 
him  with  the  greatest  wrarmth  and  a  few 
days  later  sent  him  a  Chinese  mandarin, 
fashioned  in  porcelain,  on  whose  finger  was 
placed  a  jewelled  ring  worth  nearly  forty 
thousand  francs. 

The  opposition  of  the  royal  princesses 
having  been  silenced,  the  next  difficulty 
that  lay  in  the  path  that  led  towards  the 
throne  was  that  of  obtaining  a  sponsor. 
The  etiquette  of  the  French  court,  very 
strict  in  this  as  in  all  other  respects,  de- 
manded that  every  woman  presented  should 
have  as  a  sponsor  some  other  woman  of 
title  who  was  herself  a  member  of  the 


PRESENTED   AT   COURT  101 

king's  court.  Ordinarily,  it  was  not  diffi- 
cult for  a  candidate  to  obtain,  from  among 
her  own  friends,  a  noblewoman  qualified 
for  the  post  of  sponsor  and  willing  to 
assume  it.  In  the  case  of  Madame  Du 
Barry,  however,  the  opposition  was  so 
strong  and  her  notoriety  so  great  that 
every  woman  who  was  approached  on  the 
subject  either  refused  on  one  pretence  or 
another,  or  else  demanded  for  her  services 
a  sum  so  exorbitant  as  to  stagger  even  such 
an  extravagant  woman  as  the  Favorite. 
One  lady  who  was  applied  to  demanded  a 
large  sum  of  money  for  herself,  the  com- 
mand of  a  regiment  for  her  son,  and  for 
her  husband,  a  government  and  the  Order 
of  the  Holy  Ghost.  Another,  the  Mar- 
quise de  Castellane  of  that  day,  stipulated 
that  she  should  receive  a  gift  of  half  a 
million  francs  and  be  created  a  duchess. 

A  presenteuse  was  found  at  last,  thanks 
to  the  indefatigable  energy  of  the  Due 
de  Richelieu,  in  the  person  of  a  certain 
Madame  de  Beam,  who  was  a  woman  of 
great  avarice  and  a  chronic  litigant  as  well. 
This  lady  was  at  this  time  one  of  the  par- 


102       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

ties  in  a  law-suit  involving  several  hundred 
thousand  francs,  and  Madame  Du  Barry's 
influence  with  the  chancellor  of  the  king- 
dom was  a  consideration  that  had  great 
weight  with  her.  In  addition  to  this  in- 
fluence, she  demanded  for  herself  a  hundred 
thousand  francs  and  a  station  in  the  royal 
household,  and  for  her  son,  the  command 
of  a  regiment. 

Even  when  her  demands  had  been  ac- 
ceded to,  this  avaricious  countess  had  the 
effrontery  to  require  the  king's  written 
promise,  and  it  was  only  by  an  artful  strat- 
egy on  the  part  of  Madame  Du  Barry  that 
the  matter  was  finally  adjusted. 

But  although  a  sponsor  had  been  found, 
the  opposition  of  the  Choiseul  party  was 
not  silenced,  and  it  was  not  until  the  mis- 
tress made  a  personal  and  tearful  appeal  to 
the  king,  aided  by  the  influence  of  her 
friend  the  Due  de  Richelieu,  that  that 
weak  and  vacillating  monarch  consented  to 
the  ceremony  which  should  give  her  once 
and  for  all  the  status  that  she  desired. 

The  presentation  took  place  on  the  22d 
of  April,  1769,  and  on  that  day  vast  num- 


PRESENTED   AT  COURT  103 

bers  of  people  went  out  from  Paris  to 
Versailles  to  witness  the  passage  of  the 
Favorite's  carriage  to  the  court.  The  ex- 
citement and  interest  manifested  in  this 
purely  ceremonial  act  is  not  difficult  to 
understand  when  we  remember  that  to 
the  clerical  party,  against  which  the  Choi- 
seul  ministry  had  always  arraigned  itself, 
Madame  Du  ISarry  was  not  a  mere  courte- 
san, the  toy  of  an  indolent,  pleasure-loving 
prince,  but  a  veritable  Moses  sent  for  the 
salvation  of  the  chosen  people  of  the 
Church.  In  her,  strange  as  it  may  seem 
to  us  of  a  different  civilization,  were  centred 
to  a  large  extent  the  hopes  of  the  Jesuits, 
for  had  she  not  already  given  assurance 
through  the  grand  almoner,  who  pleaded 
her  cause  with  the  royal  princesses,  that  her 
influence  would  be  thrown  with  that  party  ? 
Therefore  thousands  of  people  gathered  at 
the  gates  of  the  park  in  Versailles  and 
waited  patiently  for  the  appearance  of  the 
carriage  with  her  well-known  livery. 

Within  the  palace  the  king,  nervous  and 
ill  at  ease,  stood  waiting  her  coming,  won- 
dering at  the  delay,  for  the  hour  had  long 


104       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

since  passed,  and  annoyed  by  the  clamor 
that  was  borne  to  his  ears  from  the  throngs 
about  the  gates.  Choiseul,  standing  beside 
him,  grew  more  and  more  exultant  as  each 
passing  minute  diminished  the  chance  of 
the  presentation  taking  place  that  day. 
On  the  other  side  of  the  royal  person  stood 
Richelieu  in  his  capacity  of  first  gentle- 
man, watching  through  the  window  with 
the  corner  of  his  eye  and  hoping,  almost 
against  hope,  that  the  familiar  equipage 
would  come  within  his  range  of  vision. 

"  What  means  all  this  uproar  ?  Why  are 
all  those  people  gathered  about  the  gates  ? " 
demanded  the  king  of  his  minister. 

*'  Sire,"  replied  Choiseul,  in  sarcastic  tones 
that  were  almost  jubilant,  "  the  people  have 
learned  that  Madame  Du  Barry  is  to  be 
presented  to-day,  and  they  have  hurried 
here  from  every  point  of  the  compass  in 
order  that  they  may  at  least  witness  her 
arrival,  as  they  are  not  able  to  be  at  the  re- 
ception which  your  Majesty  will  give  her." 

A  moment  later  Louis  XV  glanced  at 
the  clock,  and  then  opened  his  lips  for  the 
purpose  of  countermanding  or  postponing 


PRESENTED   AT   COURT 


105 


the  presentation,  but  at  this  instant  Riche- 
lieu caught  sight  of  the  Favorite's  carriage 
crossing  the  great  court  and  exclaimed, 
"  Sire,  here  is  Madame  Du  Barry." 


Sedan  chair. 

Woman-like,  and  knowing,  too,  the  vast 
importance  of  looking  her  best  that  day, 
she  had  lingered  too  long  at  her  dressing- 
table.  But,  if  the  chronicles  of  that  period 
are  to  be  believed,  the  results  were  well 
worth  the  sacrifice  of  time.  For  neither 
canvas  nor  marble  has  ever  fitly  repro- 


106       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

duced  those  charming  seductions  of  form 
and  that  exquisite  beauty  of  face  in  which 
were  realized  the  ideal  of  eighteenth  cen- 
tury beauty.  There  was  one  portrait  of 
her,  however,  which,  though  it  but  faintly 
pictured  her  charms,  nevertheless  moved 
Voltaire  to  exclaim,  "  The  original  was 
made  for  the  gods  !  " 

Her  hair  was  long,  silky,  curling  like  the 
hair  of  a  child,  and  blonde  with  an  exquisite 
auburn  tint.  Her  eyebrows  and  eyelashes 
were  dark  and  curly,  and  beneath  them  the 
blue  eyes,  which  one  seldom  saw  quite 
open,  looked  out  with  coquettish  sidelong 
glances.  The  nose  was  small  and  finely 
cut,  and  the  mouth  a  perfect  Cupid's  bow. 
The  neck,  the  arms,  her  feet  and  her  hands 
reminded  one  of  ancient  Greek  statuary, 
while  her  complexion  was  that  of  a  rose- 
leaf  steeped  in  milk.  She  carried  with  her 
a  delicious  atmosphere  of  intoxicating,  vic- 
torious, amorous  youth. 

Her  costume  was  a  triumph  of  the  dress- 
maker's art  and  was  of  the  kind  called  by 
the  women  of  her  century  "  a  fighting  cos- 
tume." Diamonds  worth  150,000  francs, 


PRESENTED   AT  COURT  109 

the  king's  gift  of  the  day  before,  still  fur- 
ther adorned  her  and  contributed  to  a 
beauty  that  was  so  radiant  and  dazzling 
that  even  her  bitterest  enemies  were  able 
to  comprehend  the  power  that  she  exercised 
over  the  king.  The  Countess  de  Beam, 
also  gorgeously  attired,  appeared  with  her, 
delighted  to  have  a  share  in  the  pomp  and 
splendor  of  the  occasion.  The  royal  prin- 
cesses, true  to  the  promise  given  their 
father,  received  her  with  a  degree  of  amia- 
bility and  courtesy  which  carried  conster- 
nation to  the  hearts  of  the  Choiseul  faction. 
They  would  not  suffer  her  to  kneel  before 
them,  but  hastened  to  raise  her  in  the 
most  gracious  manner  when  she  began  to 
perform  that  act  of  homage. 

The  king  himself  was  even  more  gracious 
in  his  manner  towards  her.  She  had  made 
a  bet  with  him  the  day  before,  that  he 
would  not  permit  her  to  bend  the  knee  to 
him,  for  he  had  threatened  to  permit  her 
to  fall  at  his  feet  without  making  the  least 
effort  to  prevent  it.  Now,  as  he  took  her 
hand  when  she  began  to  stoop  before  him, 
she  exclaimed,  "  You  have  lost,  sire."- 


110       THE  STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

"  How  is  it  possible  to  preserve  my  dig- 
nity in  the  presence  of  so  many  graces  ? " 
he  exclaimed  in  a  voice  loud  enough  to  be 
heard  by  those  who  stood  near  by. 

That  evening  Jeanette  Du  Barry  enter- 
tained at  her  house  a  score  of  the  highest 
dignitaries  in  the  land,  in  the  presence  of 
whom  the  king  embraced  her  warmly,  say- 
ing :  "  You  are  a  charming  creature,"  a 
compliment  which  was  quickly  echoed  on 
all  sides,  and  the  next  day  all  Paris  knew 
that  her  place  by  the  king's  left  hand  was 
permanent  and  secure. 

In  the  mere  act  of  this  presentation,  in 
the  cabals  which  favored  or  opposed  it,  in 
the  great  significance  with  which  it  was 
invested,  and  in  the  splendor  of  the  function 
itself,  there  is  material  for  a  great  drama. 
In  the  play  of  Du  Barry,  however,  it  is 
not  touched  upon. 


CHAPTER   VI 

THE    PETIT    LEVEE 

N  the  third  act  of  his  play 
the  dramatist  teaches 
the  present  generation, 
in  a  manner  so  vivid 
that  no  one  can  see  it 
without  carrying  away 
a  lasting  recollection  of 
it,  what  it  meant  to  be  the  favorite  of  a 
Bourbon  king  a  century  and  a  half  ago. 
In  this  act  Madame  Du  Barry  is  shown 
in  the  bedroom  of  her  apartments  at  Ver- 
sailles, holding  one  of  thepetits  levees  which 
were  of  such  ordinary  occurrence  in  those 
days.  By  this  time  the  presentation  has 
taken  place,  her  power  is  acknowledged  by 
all,  and  there  is  no  prince  or  princess  of 
the  blood  royal,  no  woman  of  the  haute 
noblesse,  no  dignitary  of  the  church,  state, 


THE   STORY   OF'DU   BARRY 

or  army  who  is  above  coming  there  to  do 
her  homage. 

To  the  student  of  history,  this  gathering 
in  the  bedchamber  of  the  most  talked-of 
Frenchwoman  of  her  day  is  a  scene  of  the 
deepest  interest.  She  is  still  in  the  heart 
of  her  quarrel  with  Choiseul,  and  h^R  visi- 
tors this  morning  are  many  of  them  from 
the  ranks  of  her  own  personal  supporters. 

The  most  distinguished  of  these  guests, 
next  to  the  king  himself,  is  the  polished 
and  sin-worn  old  diplomat,  the  Due  de 
Richelieu,  who  comes  tripping  in  to  pay 
his  court  to  the  Favorite  with  all  the 
smirks  and  graces  of  a  nobleman  of  the  old 
regime.  Accomplished  as  he  is  in  the  arts 
of  the  courtier,  familiar  by  long  experience 
and  practice  in  the  school  of  diplomacy, 
with  the  consummate  and  subtle  art  of  mask- 
ing his  feelings  and  intentions  behind  a  face 
that  smiles  and  gives  no  sign,  he  has  not 
been  clever  enough  to  deceive  the  woman 
whose  knowledge  of  court  customs  has  been 
gained  within  a  single  twelvemonth.  In 
the  vernacular  of  to-day,  she  has  "  sized  him 
up"  long  ago,  and  her  impressions  of  his 


THE   PETIT  LEVEE  113 

character   have  been  handed  down  to   us 
in  the  following  words  : 

"  This  nobleman,"  she  says,  "  when  in 
his  seventy-second  year,  had  preserved  all 
his  former  pretensions  to  notice.  His  suc- 
cess in  so  many  love  affairs  —  a  success 
which  he  never  could  have  merited  —  had 
rendered  him  celebrated.  He  was  now  a 
superannuated  coxcomb,  a  wearisome  and 
clumsy  butterfly.  When,  however,  he 
could  be  brought  to  exercise  his  sense  by 
remembering  that  he  was  no  longer  young, 
he  became  fascinating  beyond  description, 
from  the  finished  ease  and  grace  of  his 
manner  and  the  polished  and  piquant  style 
of  his  discourse.  Still  I  speak  of  him  as  a 
mere  man  of  outward  show,  for  his  attain- 
ments were  superficial,  and  he  possessed 
more  of  the  jargon  of  a  man  of  letters  than 
the  sound  reality.  He  possessed  a  most 
ignoble  turn  of  mind.  All  feelings  of  an 
elevated  nature  were  wanting  with  him. 
A  bad  son,  an  unkind  husband,  and  a  worse 
father,  he  could  scarcely  be  expected  to 
become  a  steady  friend.  All  whom  he 
feared,  he  hesitated  not  to  trample  under- 


114       THE   STORY   OF   UU   BARKY 

foot,  and  his  favorite  maxim  Mras,  '  We 
should  never  hesitate  to  set  our  foot  upon 
the  necks  of  all  those  who  might  in  any 
way  interfere  with  our  progress.'  '  Dead 
men  tell  no  tales,'  he  would  always  add. 
Between  himself  and  Voltaire,  who  called 
him  the  '  tyrant  of  the  tennis  court,'  a  strong 
personal  enmity  always  existed." 

Another  important  visitor  is  Monsieur  de 
Maupeou,  at  that  time  the  Lord  Chancellor 
of  the  king,  and  of  whom  Madame  Du 
Barry  says : 

"  Monsieur  de  Maupeou  possessed  one  of 
those  firm  and  superior  minds,  which,  in 
spite  of  all  obstacles,  changes  the  face  of 
Empires.  Ardent,  yet  cool ;  bold,  but  re- 
flective ;  neither  did  the  clamors  of  the 
populace  astonish,  nor  obstacles  arrest  him. 
He  went  on  in  the  direct  path  which  his  will 
chalked  out.  Quitting  the  magistracy,  he 
became  its  most  implacable  enemy,  and, 
after  a  deadly  combat,  he  came  off  con- 
queror. He  felt  that  the  moment  had 
arrived  for  freeing  royalty  from  the  chains 
which  it  had  imposed  upon  itself.  It  was 
necessary,  he  has  said  to  me  a  hundred 


. 


THE   PETIT  LEVEE  117 

times,  for  the  kings  of  France  in  past  ages 
to  have  a  popular  power  on  which  they 
could  rely  for  the  overturning  of  the  feudal 
power.  '  Before  fifty  years,'  he  said  to  me 
once,  'kings  will  be  nothing  in  France, 
and  parliaments  will  be  everything.'  As 
brave,  personally,  as  a  marshal  of  France, 
his  enemies,  and  he  had  many,  called  him 
a  coarse  and  quarrelsome  man.  Hated  by 
all,  he  despised  men  in  a  body,  and  jeered 
at  them  individually.  Insensible  to  the 
charms  of  our  sex,  he  only  thought  of  us 
casually  and  as  a  means  of  relaxation." 

Another  notable  figure  at  the  petit  levee 
is  the  Abbe  Terray,  the  Minister  of  Fi- 
nance. This  astute  and  utterly  unprin- 
cipled politician  was  not  slow  in  allying 
himself  with  the  faction  that  gathered 
about  the  Favorite,  and  she,  on  her  part, 
could  not  have  found  a  more  docile  or  use- 
ful supporter.  As  Controller- General  of 
the  Finances  of  the  Kingdom,  he  literally 
held  the  purse-strings,  and  he  was  politic 
enough  to  loosen  them  whenever  the  king's 
mistress  commanded.  That  he  was  fre- 
quently called  upon  to  do  so,  may  be 


118       THE   STORY  OF   DU   BARRY 

inferred  from  the  richness  of  the  bedcham- 
ber and  its  furnishings,  as  well  as  from  the 
fact  that  during  the  five  years  of  her  reign, 
Madame  Du  Barry's  personal  expenditures 
amounted  to  over  twelve  million  livres,  a 
sum  of  money  whose  purchasing  capacity 
about  equalled  that  of  the  same  number  of 
dollars  at  the  present  day.  Her  dress- 
maker's bill  alone  amounted  to  a  quarter 
of  a  million  livres  a  year,  and  she  had 
already  found  that  silver,  even  when  it  was 
the  work  of  the  very  best  craftsmen  in 
France,  was  not  good  enough  for  her,  and 
must  be  replaced  by  solid  gold.  There 
was  a  toilet  service  ordered  in  the  same 
precious  metal,  and  the  government  paid 
to  Roettiers,  the  greatest  carver  of  plate  in 
France,  the  sum  of  fifteen  hundred  gold 
marks  as  an  advance  payment,  before  he 
would  undertake  the  work.  But  scandal, 
caused  by  this  piece  of  useless  extrava- 
gance, put  a  stop  to  the  work,  and  the  gold 
toilet  service  was  never  finished. 

It  is  not  unlikely  that  an  understanding 
existed  between  Madame  l)u  Barry  and  the 
Abbe  Terray,  through  which  the  Minister 


THE  PETIT  LEVE'E  119 

of  Finance  secured  for  himself  a  percentage 
of  what  he  permitted  her  to  squander.  It 
is  a  matter  of  history  that  his  mistress, 
known  in  fashionable  Parisian  circles  by 
the  name  of  La  Sultane,  received  money, 
presumably  in  collusion  with  the  Abbe, 
for  every  act  of  favor  or  justice  solicited 
from  the  department  which  he  controlled. 
Indeed,  this  degraded  creature  and  Madame 
Sabatin,  the  mistress  of  the  Due  de  la 
Vrilliere,  kept  open  shop  for  the  sale  of 
preferments  of  all  kinds. 

The  Count  Jean  Du  Barry  is  also  a  visi- 
tor at  the  petit  levee,  nor  is  it  surprising  to 
see  him  in  quest  of  money.     The  class  of 
men  to  which  he  belongs  is 
one  that  in  all  ages  has  found 
its  chief  support  in  the  earn- 
ings of  frail  women.     It  is  a 
class,  by  the  way,  which  has 
not  yet  passed  from  off 
the  face  of  the  earth,  and 
has  its  representatives  in 
the  good  society  of  the 
present  day  as  well  as  in 
the   slums.     Jean   Du  ... 

Punch  bowl. 


120       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

Barry,  who  has  always  been  known  as  a 
man  of  extravagant  tastes,  is  now  rapacious 
in  his  demand,  and,  from  what  we  know 
of  his  character,  we  do  not  feel  that  the 
dramatist  has  strayed  far  from  historical 
accuracy  when  he  reveals  him  in  the  light 
of  a  blackmailer. 

His  Eminence,  the  Papal  Nuncio,  is  here 
too  in  the  mimic  scene,  as  he  frequently 
was  in  the  flesh  when  the  real  Madame 
Du  Barry  held  her  petit s  levees  in  the  great 
palace  of  Versailles.  Moreover  he  seems 
to  be  a  trusted  adviser,  as  well  as  a  friend 
who  lends  the  weight  of  his  influence  in 
her  behalf  in  her  quarrel  with  the  king. 

Another  guest  is  the  young  girl  of  six- 
teen, the  Princess  Marie  Antoinette,  to 
whose  memory  clings  the  tragic  pathos  of  a 
queen's  martyrdom. 

"  She  appeared  to  me  less  beautiful  and 
fair  than  pleasant  and  ladylike,"  says 
Madame  Du  Barry,  in  describing  the  im- 
pression made  on  her  by  this  young  prin- 
cess on  her  first  arrival  from  Austria. 
"Her  hair  was  of  a  reddish  auburn,  but 
her  skin  was  of  a  dazzling  white.  She  had 


THE   PETIT   LEVEE  121 

a  beautiful  forehead,  a  delicious  set  of  teeth, 
a  well-formed  nose,  and  eyes  full  of  vivac- 
ity and  expression.  Her  air  was  majestic 
and  dignified.  She  walked  well ;  her  figure 
was  well  shaped,  and  her  gestures  were 
more  free  and  unstudied  than  those  of  the 
princesses  of  the  blood  royal  of  France." 

This  princess,  however,  did  not  have  agood 
opinion  of  the  Favorite,  toward  whom  her 
conduct  at  first  was  so  frigid  that  the 
king  summoned  the  Austrian  ambassador, 
Mercy- Argenteau,  explained  to  him  his 
wishes,  and  bade  him  use  whatever  influence 
he  possessed  to  induce  her  to  conform  to 
them.  The  ambassador,  alarmed  at  the 
prospect  of  anything  like  coolness  between 
the  two  royal  houses,  and  knowing  how 
much  trouble  can  be  brought  about  by  the 
obstinacy  of  one  young  woman,  instantly 
despatched  letters  to  his  sovereign,  the 
Empress  Maria  Theresa,  in  which  he  ex- 
plained to  her  the  precise  state  of  affairs  at 
the  French  court.  He  described  the  in- 
fatuation of  the  king  for  the  new  Favorite, 
and  took  pains  to  relate  the  manner  in 
which  His  Majesty  showed  his  displeasure 


122       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

when  the  least  slight  was  put  upon  her. 
In  view  of  these  conditions,  he  begged  the 
empress  to  use  her  influence  with  her 
daughter,  and  persuade  her  to  address  a  few 
civil  words  to  a  woman  whom  the  king  had 
honored  by  his  regard.  The  empress  saw 
the  force  of  his  argument,  and  wrote  at 
once  to  her  daughter,  urging  her  to  remem- 
ber what  was  due  the  king  at  whose  court 
she  was  living.  At  last,  in  obedience  to 
her  mother,  Marie  Antoinette  consented 
to  receive  the  Favorite ;  and  statesmen, 
who  had  foreseen,  as  an  outcome  of  her 
obstinacy  possible  trouble  with  Austria, 
breathed  freely  again. 

Whether  or  no  the  dauphiness  ever 
overcame  her  feeling  of  repugnance  toward 
Madame  Du  Barry  to  such  an  extent  as  to 
attend  one  of  her  pctits  levees,  is  a  fact  on 
which  history  throws  but  little  light,  so  we 
may  accept  the  picture  as  the  dramatist  has 
painted  it  for  us.  Certainly  her  presence 
in  this  scene  lends  a  new  interest  to  it. 

Denys,  the  faithful  servant  who  follows 
Madame  Du  Barry's  changing  fortunes  to 
their  bitter  end,  is  a  character  who  really 


THE   PETIT   LEVEE  125 

existed,  and  who  was  deeply  attached  to 
his  mistress. 

Another  type  of  servitor  was  Zamore, 
the  black  dwarf,  whom  we  see  squatting  on 
a  rug  beside  the  Favorite's  bed.  Creatures 
of  this  sort  were  frequently  maintained  in 
luxurious  houses  in  those  days,  in  Paris  and 
in  London  as  well.  We  encounter  them, 
more  than  once,  in  the  pictures  which 
Hogarth  painted  of  dissolute  London  life 
of  exactly  that  time.  Zamore  received 
innumerable  favors  at  the  hands  of  Madame 
Du  Barry  and  her  royal  lover,  but,  in  the 
end,  turned  against  her,  and  at  her  trial 
gave  testimony  which  contributed  mate- 
rially to  her  conviction. 

Madame  Du  Barry  had  received  Zamore 
at  the  hands  of  the  usually  penurious  Due 
de  Richelieu,  who  turned  him  over  to  her, 
clad  in  his  native  garb  of  pleated  grass  and 
adorned  with  bracelets,  earrings  and  neck- 
lace of  solid  gold,  fashioned  in  barbaric  style. 
He  was  a  hideously  ugly  little  savage  with 
no  more  respect  for  persons  than  one 
would  have  looked  for  in  a  monkey.  He 
was  funny,  however,  in  a  rude  simian  way, 


126       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

and  could  make  grimaces  and  distort  his 
puny  body  in  such  a  way  as  to  set  his 
mistress  off  into  roars  of  laughter.  He 
had  scant  respect  for  her  visitors,  and  was 
wont  to  amuse  himself  and  the  company 
by  snatching  the  wig  from  the  head  of 
some  aged  courtier,  leaving  his  victim  a 
bald  target  for  the  laughter  of  the  rest. 

Pleasantries  of  this  order  seem  to  have 
been  rather  to  the  taste  of  his  Most  Chris- 
tian Majesty,  Louis  XV,  for  history  tells 
us  that  once,  in  appreciation  of  some  par- 
ticularly entrancing  exhibition  of  this  subtle 
and  engrossing  form  of  humor,  he  rewarded 
the  young  African  with  the  post  of  gov- 
ernor of  the  Chateau  of  Louveciennes,  an 
office  carrying  with  it  a  salary  of  one  thou- 
sand crowns. 

The  Jeanette  Du  Barry  who  figures  in 
this  act  has  made  distinct  progress  along 
her  chosen  path  since  we  last  saw  her  in 
the  gambling  house.  It  is  true  that  she 
is,  at  heart,  the  same  wanton,  good-hearted, 
good-tempered  young  woman  whose  chief 
concern  is  for  the  pleasures  of  this  life ;  but 
now  her  destiny  is  assured,  whereas  her  life 


THE   PETIT   LEVEE  127 

at  the  gaming  house  was  merely  a  prelimi- 
nary glance  into  the  brilliant,  dissolute  and 
luxurious  world  that  lay  before  her.  Now 
she  has  realized  the  very  highest  dream 
that  any  woman  of  her  class  ever  dared 
to  indulge  in.  The  all-powerful  king  of 
France  is  madly  in  love  with  her,  and 
there  is  nothing,  from  the  dismissal  of  a 
minister  to  the  price  of  a  jewelled  bauble, 
that  she  may  not  ask  and  receive  at  his 
hands. 

I  declare  that  I  can  think  of  no  more  in- 
structive spectacle,  nor  of  one  better  worth 
the  consideration  of  a  philosopher,  than  that 
of  this  pampered  mistress  reclining  in  her 
splendid  bed,  with  the  gorgeously  capari- 
soned ape,  Zamore,  by  her  side,  and  minis- 
ters, prelates  and  royalty  gathering  to  do 
her  honor. 

The  chief  interest  in  this  act  is  one  of 
love,  and  here  the  inventive  genius  of  the 
dramatist  comes  into  play.  Having  taken 
the  love  between  Jeanette  Du  Carry  and 
Cosse-Brissac  as  the  chief  motive  of  his 
drama,  Mr.  Belasco  avails  himself  of  his 
dramatic  license  to  assume  that  there  was 


128       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

jealousy  on  the  part  of  the  king,  and,  logi- 
cally enough,  that  that  jealousy  resulted  in 
a  bitter  quarrel  between  himself  and  his 
mistress.  He  shows  us,  too,  how  the  heart 
of  woman,  even  though  that  woman  be  the 
Favorite  of  a  king,  must  break  all  artificial 
bonds  imposed  by  high  station  and  self- 
interest  and  rule  her  whole  life. 

It  is  reasonable  enough  to  assume  that 
Jeanette  Du  Barry  had  more  than  one  love 
affair  beside  that  supreme  one  with  the 
king,  during  the  period  of  her  reign.  Hos- 
tile historians,  who  pander  to  that  horror 
of  immorality  and  taste  for  reading  about 
it  which  characterizes  Anglo  Saxon  virtue, 
ascribe  to  her  a  legion  of  sweethearts,  and 
her  own  memoirs  indicate  that  she  was  not 
altogether  true  to  the  king. 

Certainly  she  must  have  had  plenty  of 
idle  time  on  her  hands ;  for,  although  she 
had  succeeded  Madame  de  Pompadour  in 
the  royal  esteem,  she  was  wise  enough  not 
to  challenge  comparison  between  herself 
and  her  predecessor  by  mixing  too  much 
in  affairs  of  state. 

The  Pompadour  had  been  a  woman  of 


THE  PETIT  LEVEE  129 

distinct  influence  in  the  affairs  of  the  world. 
Not  only  had  she  amused  the  king  with 
her  theatre,  her  conversation,  her  supper 
parties,  and  the  brilliant  men  and  women 
whom  she  gathered  together  for  his  enter- 
tainment, but  she  had  also  sought  to  relieve 
him  of  many  of  the  serious  duties  of  his 
exalted  position.  Her  life  had  been  one 
of  constant  intrigue ;  of  intimacy  with 
cabinet  ministers,  statesmen  and  men  of 
business  ;  of  interest  in  politics,  —  in  short, 
her  role  was  one  of  actual  power  openly 
exercised. 

Madame  Du  Barry,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  content  with  her  position  as  Favorite, 
and,  apart  from  her  struggle  with  the 
Choiseuls  and  the  various  squabbles  with 
the  ladies  of  the  court  into  which  she  was 
drawn,  she  did  not  figure  prominently  in 
the  affairs  of  her  time.  Her  chief  delight 
was  in  spending  money,  and  nowhere  is  the 
real  history  of  the  reign  more  accurately 
summed  up  than  in  the  four  volumes  of 
her  expense  accounts  purchased  some  years 
ago  by  the  National  Library. 

Like  every  woman  of  her  class,  she  was 


130       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

passionately  fond  of  the  luxuries  of  life,  and 
utterly  heedless  of  their  cost  so  long  as 
there  was  some  one  to  pay  the  bills  for  her. 
In  these  accounts  we  read  of  dresses  cost- 
ing from  one  to  ten  thousand  livres,  of  a 
watch  costing  nearly  six  thousand  francs, 
of  the  same  sum  spent  for  the  gildings  on 
her  bed,  of  lace  that  cost  three  or  four 
thousand  livres  for  each  dress,  of  superb 
furniture,  of  bronzes,  of  everything,  in 
short,  that  the  richly  decorative  age  of 
Louis  XV  could  supply. 

The  morning  receptions  in  her  bedcham- 
ber were  not  given  over  altogether  to  the 
visits  of  personages  of  distinction.  It  was 
at  this  time  that  tradesmen  came  to  her 
with  their  newest  and  choicest  wares,  and 
workmen  received  instructions  and  sub- 
mitted to  her  the  half-completed  articles 
of  beauty  and  utility  which  she  had 
ordered,  and  which  she  loved  to  inspect 
from  time  to  time.  That  her  taste  was 
good,  is  evident  from  such  of  her  posses- 
sions as  are  still  in  existence.  Nor  is  this 
to  be  wondered  at,  when  we  remember  the 
great  influence  that  the  demi-monde  has 


c 


THE   PETIT  LEVEE  133 

always  exerted  on  the  dress,  jewelry  and 
other  ornaments  of  the  polite  world. 

The  de  Goncour  Memoirs  have  this  to 
say  about  Moreau's  picture  of  a  fete  given 
by  the  Favorite  in  honor  of  her  royal  lover 
at  her  Chateau  of  Louveciennes,  December 
27,  1771  :  "Throughout  the  apartment,  all 
white  and  gold,  a  vapor  of  light  seems  to 
rise  from  the  lustres  hanging  in  front  of 
the  mirror  between  the  columns,  shedding 
on  them  flashes  to  which  other  flashes 
respond  in  other  mirrors,  handfuls  of  flame 
which  fling  into  the  air  four  figures  of 
women  carved  in  marble  by  Pajou,  Le 
Count,  and  Moineau,  and  standing  on  mar- 
ble socles  with  golden  wreaths.  Around 
the  table,  surrounded  by  curious  lookers-on, 
behind  the  round  backs  of  the  armchairs  and 
the  clubs  of  the  chattering  guests' 

perukes,  the  attendants,    the 

servants,  the        %^fifc  ^^    persons  carry- 
ing  dishes, 
keep    coming 
and  going  rapidly, 
some     in     yellow 
straw  liveries,  others 

Slippers. 


134       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

in  crimson  velvet  coats  with  facings,  with 
blue  collars  and  wristbands,  with  white 
boot-tops  and  white  gaiters,  three-cornered 
hats  on  their  heads,  and  swords  by  their 
sides.  You  see  even  little  Zamore  in  a 
turban  with  feathers,  a  rose-colored  vest 
and  breeches,  gliding  towards  a  lady  who 
has  doubtless  left  some  bonbons  on  her 
plate.  The  crystal,  the  silver,  the  struc- 
ture representing  an  opera  scene,  which 
rises  above  the  tablecloth,  the  cordons  bleus, 
the  diamonds,  the  smiles  on  the  faces  of 
the  guests,  all  keep  the  table  in  a  glow ; 
and  in  the  brilliant  light  shed  around  them 
is  seen,  by  the  side  of  Madame  Du  Barry's 
pretty  countenance,  the  handsome,  noble 
face  of  Louis  XV." 

There  is  more  than  a  suggestion  of  all 
this  in  the  superb  scene  which  constitutes 
the  fourth  act  of  Mr.  Belasco's  play,  —  the 
act  in  which  the  highest  point  of  dramatic 
interest  is  attained.  It  is  in  this  act,  too, 
that  the  dramatist  touches  the  deepest  and 
most  significant  note  in  his  entire  work. 

It  is  not  easy  to  convey,  in  mere  words, 
an  adequate  idea  of  the  splendid  picture  of 


THE   PETIT   LEVEE  135 

luxury  that  is  set  before  us  here  under  the 
rays  of  a  smiling  harvest  moon.  Up  and 
down  the  marble  steps  and  across  the  stage, 
ambassadors,  noblemen,  and  court  ladies 
come  and  go,  laughing  gayly  and  with  no 
thought  save  for  the  caprice  or  intrigue  or 
ambition  of  the  moment.  Opera-dancers 
whirl  and  pirouette  on  tiptoe  for  the  en- 
tertainment of  the  guests  ;  clowns,  all  in 
white,  come  somersaulting  across  the  floor ; 
tables  are  spread  in  sumptuous  fashion ;  a 
huge  bowl  of  flaming  brandy  punch  is 
served,  and  the  guests  amuse  themselves 
by  throwing  about  illuminated  balls.  At 
a  signal  from  the  mistress,  servants,  bearing 
a  score  of  rich  candelabra,  come  upon  the 
scene,  and  the  stage  is  lit  up  with  that  real 
candlelight  which  electricity  cannot  coun- 
terfeit. 

Never,  perhaps,  has  our  stage  presented 
such  a  luxurious  and  gorgeous  spectacle  as 
this.  But  beneath  it  all  there  is  an  omi- 
nous note  that  we,  whose  vision  has  been 
made  clear  with  the  light  of  after-knowl- 
edge, cannot  help  seeing.  The  writing  is 
on  the  wall,  but  there  is  no  Daniel  to 


136       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

interpret  it.  The  keen,  glittering  knife 
that  the  actress  sees  in  fancy  from  the 
moment  when  she  first  comes  on  the  stage, 
is  hanging  over  a  score  of  those  bewigged 
and  bepowdered  heads. 

Valois,  the  young  revolutionary,  has 
already  been  brought  in  by  the  guards, 
and,  before  he  can  be  taken  away  to  execu- 
tion, has  contrived  to  fling  in  the  faces  of 
his  captors,  a  word  of  defiant  warning  ;  but 
they  give  him  no  heed.  Now,  however, 
from  without  the  gates,  comes  the  noise  of 
angry  mutterings  and  discontent,  for  the 
people,  starved  and  over-taxed  to  support 
all  this  riotous  waste,  are  clamoring  for 
bread.  Their  murmurings  reach  the  ears 
of  Louis  the  Well  Beloved,  and  he  comes 
striding  out  of  his  palace  to  demand  its 
cause. 

"  Am  I  king  or  not,  that  this  rabble 
should  disturb  my  pleasure  ? "  he  cries 
haughtily.  And  which  one  of  us  is  there 
so  dull  and  devoid  of  imagination  as  not 
to  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  gleaming  knife 
conjured  up  by  his  words  ? 

The  soldiers  go  out  to  disperse  the  mob, 


THE   PETIT   LEVEE 


137 


and  their  clamor  ceases ;  the  distant  roll 
of  the  drums  tells  us  that  the  name  of 
Valois  has  been  written  in  his  own  blood 
upon  the  long  roll  of  those  who  have  died 
for  principle ;  the  king  and  his  bejewelled 
mistress  again  lead  the  court  in  the  mad 
hunt  after  pleasure,  but  that  clamor  at  the 
outer  gates  is  one  that  will  not  down.  A 
powdered  head  will  fall  for  every  drop  of 
Valois  blood  that  has  been  shed  to-night. 


CHAPTER   VII 

A   PRIME   MINISTER'S    DOWNFALL 

N  the  month  of  July  of 
the  year  1769,  Sir  Hor- 
ace Walpole  writes  as 
follows:  "Well!  I  am 
going  to  a  quiet  little 
town  where  they  have 
had  nothing  but  one 
woman  to  talk  of  for  this  twelvemonth,  — 
I  mean  Paris.  Madame  Du  Barry  gains 
ground,  and  yet  Monsieur  de  Choiseul  car- 
ries all  his  points.  He  has  taken  Corsica, 
bought  Sweden,  made  a  pope,  got  the 
Czarina  drubbed  by  the  Turks,  and  has 
restored  the  Parliament  of  Bretagne,  in 
spite  of  the  Due  D'Aiguillon,  —  for  revenge 
can  make  so  despotic  and  ambitious  a  man 
as  Choiseul  even  turn  patriot,  - —  and  yet 
at  this  moment  I  believe  he  dreads  my 


o 

.1»» 

•v. 

3 


A  PRIME  MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL   141 

Lord  Chatham  more  than  Madame  Du 
Barry." 

Time  has  shown,  however,  that  the  great 
minister  who  was  at  one  time  the  virtual 
master  of  France  had  more  to  fear  from 
the  French  courtesan  than  from  the  Eng- 
lish statesman.  The  struggle  between  him- 
self, egged  on  by  his  sister,  the  Duchesse  de 
Grammont,  on  the  one  side,  and  the  Favo- 
rite, aided  by  her  own  faction,  on  the  other, 
resulted  at  last  in  the  dismissal  of  the  min- 
ister. Before  this  final  catastrophe,  how- 
ever, occurred  a  contretemps  between  the 
two  women  that  may  be  said  to  have  served 
as  a  prelude  to  his  downfall. 

As  may  be  easily  believed,  the  duchess 
was  one  of  the  first  to  pay  court  to  the 
dauphiness,  Marie  Antoinette,  on  her  ar- 
rival at  Versailles,  and  so  skilful  was  she 
in  the  art  of  making  herself  agreeable,  that 
the  princess  conceived  a  strong  liking  for 
her,  and  consulted  her  on  innumerable  sub- 
jects relating  to  her  life  at  court. 

Now  it  is  related  that  this  young  princess 
was  so  innocent  in  regard  to  worldly  wicked- 
ness, that  she  once  artlessly  asked  who  Mad- 


142       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

ame  Du  Barry  was,  and  what  her  precise 
status  was  in  the  entourage  of  Louis  XV. 
It  is  not  likely  that  the  Duchesse  de  Gram- 
mont,  who  had  perhaps  been  waiting  for  a 
convenient  opportunity  to  express  herself, 
permitted  the  future  Queen  of  France  to 
remain  longer  in  the  dark  concerning  the 
character  and  antecedents  of  her  grand- 
father's mistress.  Possibly  she  was  one  of 
those  raconteurs  who,  as  the  Irish  say, 
"  never  let  a  story  go  out  without  a  cocked 
hat  and  a  cane."  Certain  it  is  that  noth- 
ing could  equal  the  abhorrence  with  which 
Marie  Antoinette  regarded  the  Favorite, 
and  the  latter  was  not  slow  to  attribute 
this  feeling  to  the  efforts  of  her  arch  enemy, 
the  duchess.  She  complained  to  the  king 
again  and  again,  but  her  lover  did  not  like 
to  be  drawn  into  quarrels  not  his  own,  and 
it  was  not  until  the  duchess  affronted  the 
woman  whom  she  detested  in  his  presence, 
and  in  such  a  manner  that  he  felt  himself 
aggrieved,  that  he  exerted  his  authority. 

It  was  at  a  moment  when  both  ladies 
were  on  their  way  to  a  levee  held  by  the 
dauphin,  and  the  duchess,  while  trying  to 


A  PRIME  MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL   143 

pass  the  other,  set  her  foot  upon  her  train 
in  such  a  way  as  to  tear  it  to  tatters,  after 
which,  without  a  word  of  apology,  she  went 
on  her  way  laughing  loudly.  It  is  difficult 
to  imagine  what  Madame  Du  Barry  would 
not  have  done  to  the  duchess  if  she  had  not 
chanced  to  read  in  the  face  of  the  king, 
who  had  been  a  witness  of  the  affair,  an 
expression  of  rage  and  offended  dignity 
which  told  her  that  she  could  safely  leave 
the  task  of  avenging  her  outraged  feelings 
in  his  hands. 

That  very  day  the  king  summoned  the 
Duchesse  de  Grammont  to  his  presence, 
sternly  rebuked  her  for  what  she  had  done, 
and  then  banished  her  from  his  court  for  a 
period  of  two  years.  Even  the  remon- 
strances and  entreaties  of  her  brother  failed 
to  have  any  effect,  and  the  next  day  the 
duchess  departed,  and  the  polite  world 
realized  that  Madame  Du  Barry's  influ- 
ence with  the  king  was  even  greater  than 
had  been  believed. 

If  it  had  not  been  for  the  persistence  of 
Monsieur  D'Aiguillon  and  others  who,  like 
himself,  were  influenced  by  their  own  per- 


144       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

sonal  ambition,  it  is  doubtful  if  Madame 
Du  Barry  would  have  persisted  in  working 
to  obtain  the  overthrow  of  the  Due  de 
Choiseul.  The  triumph  over  his  sister  was 
enough  to  satisfy  a  woman  of  her  light, 
easy-going  nature  who  had  no  desire  to  be 
dragged  from  her  toilet-table  and  the  mat- 
ters which  were  of  serious  moment  to  her, 
to  take  part  in  political  cabals  which  she 
imperfectly  understood  and  for  which  she 
cared  but  little. 

At  the  very  outset  of  her  career  at  Ver- 
sailles she  had  diligently  paid  court  to  the 
great  minister,  to  whom  she  wrote  amiably 
and  in  the  humble  tone  of  one  who  seeks 
the  friendship  and  regard  of  a  superior. 
She  interested  herself  on  behalf  of  his 
brother,  the  Comte  de  Stainville,  whom  she 
permitted  to  secure  the  reversion  of  the 
Governorship  of  Strasburg,  and  she  even 
went  so  far  as  to  ignore  the  contemptuous 
attitude  of  the  Duchesse  de  Grammont  and 
the  fierce  war  of  insulting  ballads,  pam- 
phlets, and  epigrams  which  the  Choiseuls, 
both  brother  and  sister,  waged  against  her. 
Moreover,  she  did  her  best  to  make  the 


The  Favorite  of  Royalty. 


A  PRIME  MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL  145 

minister  understand  that  her  influence  with 
the  king  was  such  as  to  make  her  a  person- 


Screen  and  toilet  table. 


age  of  far  greater  influence  than  himself, 
and  she  warned  him  that  if  he  continued 


10 


146       THE   STORY    OF   DU   BARRY 

to  struggle  against  her,  he  must  inevitably 
get  the  worst  of  it. 

Meanwhile  the  exiled  duchess  was  trav- 
elling through  France  under  pretence  of 
health-seeking,  and  busying  herself  with 
the  various  parliamentary  leaders  whom 
she  met  on  the  way.  Naturally  enough 
the  D'Aiguillon  faction  took  it  upon  them- 
selves to  see  that  the  king  was  informed 
in  regard  to  everything  that  the  roving 
duchess  did  and  said,  arid  although  this 
knowledge  made  him  cool  towards  the 
adviser  in  whose  talents  he  firmly  believed, 
nevertheless  he  continued  to  consult  him, 
to  work  with  him,  and  to  invite  him  to  eat 
and  drink  with  him. 

All  this  having  been  made  known  to 
D'Aiguillon  by  his  faithful  pensioner,  he 
redoubled  his  efforts  with  the  Favorite,  and 
besought  her,  as  she  valued  her  own  power 
at  court,  to  use  every  art  that  she  possessed 
to  extort  from  the  king  the  lettre  de  cachet 
which  should  send  the  Due  de  Choiseul 
into  ignominious  exile. 

Never  before,  perhaps,  did  the  mistress 
of  a  Bourbon  king  work  with  less  zest 


and  malevolence  for  the  banishment  of  a 
prime  minister  than  did  Madame  Du  Barry 
for  that  of  Choiseul.  She  was  kept  at 
her  work  entirely  by  the  persistency  of 
D'Aiguillon,  who  teased  her  night  and  day, 
trying  to  interest  her  in  his  own  ambitions 
and  hates,  and  seeking  by  every  means  in 
his  power  to  instil  into  her  soft  heart  and 
easy-going  disposition  some  of  the  poison 
of  his  own  vindictiveness. 

Roused  at  last  by  the  ceaseless  prompt- 
ings of  the  ambitious  D'Aiguillon,  and  the 
strong  pressure  brought  to  bear  on  her  by 
everybody  who  had  anything  whatever  to 
gain  by  Choiseul's  fall,  she  began  to  harass 
her  royal  lover,  and  more  than  once  used 
her  blandishments  with  such  effect  that 
the  lettre  de  cachet  was  actually  written  at 
night,  only  to  be  torn  up  in  the  morning 
when  sober  sense  banished  the  fumes  of 
wine  from  the  royal  brain.  It  was  not, 
however,  until  the  arts  of  political  intrigue 
had  been  nearly  exhausted  that  the  party 
of  the  opposition  found  a  mode  of  attack 
which  compelled  the  king  to  the  belief  that 
it  was  necessary  for  him  to  take  speedy 


150       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

and  definite  action.  Choiseul  had  always 
sought  to  impress  the  king  with  the  idea 
that  his  highest  ambition  for  France  was 
to  keep  her  at  peace  with  all  the  rest  of 
the  world.  Against  this  impression  the 
opposition  skilfully  directed  their  forces  of 
attack  by  circulating  the  rumor  that  the 
prime  minister  was  really  endeavoring  to 
restore  his  waning  prestige  by  involving  his 
country  in  war.  In  proof  of  this,  they 
declared  that  he  was  trifling  with  the  con- 
fidence of  Spain,  and  at  the  same  time 
intriguing  against  England.  The  king 
well  knew  that  a  very  few  weeks  before 
his  prime  minister  had  actually  placed  on 
the  council  table  the  scheme  for  a  descent 
on  England  which  had  been  prepared 
under  the  direction  of  Monsieur  de  Eroglie 
in  the  year  1766,  and  had  himself  brought 
forward  witnesses  to  assure  the  king  of  its 
practicability. 

The  confidence  of  Louis  XV  in  his 
minister  having  thus  been  shaken,  Madame 
Du  Barry's  turn  arrived,  and  she,  availing 
herself  of  a  favorable  moment,  told  him 
that  if  he  wished  to  know  the  truth  in 


A  PRIME  MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL    151 

regard  to  the  negotiations  with  Spain, 
he  had  only  to  send  for  the  Abbe  de 
la  Ville,  M.  de  Choiseul's  clerk,  who 
was  thoroughly  familiar  ^with  the  whole 
matter. 

Now  this  Abbe  de  la  Ville  had  begun 
life  as  a  Jesuit,  and  had  left  that  order  to  be- 
come a  secular  priest.  When  the  great 
Fenelon  went  to  Holland  as  ambassador, 
he  accompanied  him  as  the  instructor  of 
his  children  ;  but  in  a  very  short  time  his 
taste  for  intrigue  and  diplomacy  made  him 
a  person  of  consequence  in  the  eyes  of 
the  ambassador,  and  he  became  secretary 
to  the  embassy,  from  which  post  he  was 
subsequently  recalled  to  take  the  posi- 
tion of  chief  clerk  in  the  office  of  Foreign 
Affairs. 

Accustomed  as  he  was  to  having  a  voice 
in  all  matters,  great  and  small,  the  Abbe  de 
la  Ville  had  been  much  chagrined  through 
the  Due  de  Choiseul's  habit  of  keeping 
his  own  counsel,  and  of  writing  even  the 
most  trivial  of  despatches  in  his  own  hand. 
The  D'Aiguillon  faction  knew  therefore 
that  he  could  be  depended  on  to  support 


152       THE   STORY    OF   DU   BARRY 

any  measure  aimed  at  the  downfall  of  a 
minister  who  despised  his  counsel  and  his 
experience,  and  actually  stood  in  the  way 
of  his  advancement. 

On  the  21st  of  December,  1770,  the 
abbe  was  summoned  with  much  secrecy  to 
the  king's  cabinet,  and  asked,  in  the  pres- 
ence of  Madame  Du  Barry,  what  the  Due 
de  Choiseul's  intentions  were  in  regard  to 
Spain. 

To  this  he  made  answer  that  the  de- 
spatches of  the  prime  minister  had  not 
been  shown  to  him,  but  that  if  His  Majesty 
desired  to  learn  for  himself  what  they  con- 
tained, he  had  only  to  order  his  minister 
to  write  a  letter  to  the  King  of  Spain,  as- 
suring him  of  King  Louis's  desire  for 
peace  and  determination  to  avoid  war  at 
all  costs. 

"  If  Monsieur  de  Choiseul  really  desires 
peace,  he  will  do  this  at  once,"  said  the  Abbe 
de  la  Ville  ;  "  but  if  he  refuses  on  one  pre- 
text or  another,  it  may  be  taken  as  evidence 
that  he  desires  war." 

King  Louis  repaired  at  once  to  the  Coun- 
cil Chamber,  and  ordered  Monsieur  de 


I 


A  PRIME  MINISTER'S  DOWNFALL   155 

Choiseul  to  write  a  letter  to  the  King  of 
Spain  assuring  him  of  the  peaceful  inten- 
tions of  his  royal  brother  of  France.  Now 
the  prime  minister  had,  as  the  D'Aiguillon 
party  well  knew,  just  sent  a  courier  to 
Spain  with  a  conciliatory  letter,  and  there- 
fore he  replied  to  the  king,  saying  that 
before  writing  again  it  would  be  best  to 
await  an  answer  to  the  letter  which  he  had 
just  sent.  Thereupon  the  king  arose  and 
left  the  chamber  without  another  word  and 
in  a  manner  that  showed  that  his  anger 
had  been  aroused. 

Two  days  later,  after  signing  a  state 
paper,  the  king  threw  the  pen  angrily  on 
the  table,  instead  of  giving  it  back  to  the 
Due  de  Choiseul,  who  had  handed  it  to 
him.  This  sign  of  displeasure  towards 
his  prime  minister  was  noticed  by  those 
present,  so  that  the  court  was  by  no  means 
surprised  to  learn,  two  days  later,  of  the 
minister's  downfall. 

The  lettre  de  cachet  in  the  king's  hand- 
writing which  was  delivered  by  the  Due 
de  la  Arrilliere  to  the  minister  was  couched 
in  the  following  words  : 


156       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

I  order  my  cousin,  the  Due  de  Choiseul,  to 
place  his  resignation  of  the  post  of  Secretary  of 
State  in  the  hands  of  the  Due  de  la  Vrilliere  and 
to  withdraw  to  Chantellout  until  there  is  a  fresh 
order  from  me.  Louis. 

AT  VERSAILLES  this  24th  of  December,  1770. 

The  victory  won,  the  Favorite  showed 
not  the  least  particle  of  malice  toward  the 
statesman  whom  she  had  helped  to  depose. 
On  the  contrary,  when  the  malevolent 
D'Aiguillon  sought  to  deprive  him  of 
his  post  of  Colonel- General  of  the  Swiss 
Guards  without  any  indemnity,  Madame 
Du  Barry  used  her  influence  with  the  king 
against  this  scheme,  and  never  rested  in  her 
personal  solicitations  until  she  had  induced 
her  lover  to  bestow  upon  the  fallen  min- 
ister a  hundred  thousand  crowns  in  money 
and  a  pension  of  sixty  thousand  livres. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE   WAGES    OF    SIN 

HE  wages  of  sin  is 
death,"  and  no  man 
ever  received  payment 
for  a  long  life  of  self- 
ishness, cruelty  and 
sensuality  in  such  hid- 
eous coin  as  that  meted 
out  to  His  Most  Christian  Majesty,  Louis 
XV  of  France. 

Death  came  to  him  in  its  most  terrible 
form  in  the  spring  of  1774,  after  a  series  of 
warnings  that  had  begun  more  than  a  year 
before  in  a  sermon  preached  in  the  chapel 
in  Versailles  during  Holy  Week  by  the 
Abbe  de  Beauvais  in  which  he  flagellated 
the  iniquities  practised  at  court,  and  even 
dared  to  hint  at  the  turpitudes  of  the  king 
himself  in  a  Biblical  allusion  concerning 


158       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

the  sensual  indulgence  of  Solomon.  Some 
weeks  later  the  same  young  priest,  who 
had  now  gained  the  protection  of  the  re- 
ligeuse  daughter  of  the  king,  Madame 
Louise,  preached  a  sermon  on  death  which 
made  a  profound  impression  on  the  worn- 
out  monarch  in  whose  breast  remorse  was 
already  beginning  to  assert  itself. 

In  this  sermon  the  courageous  and  truth- 
telling  young  abbe  recalled  to  the  king's 
memory  the  death  of  the  Duke  of  Bur- 
gundy, of  the  dauphin  and  dauphiness,  of 
the  queen,  of  his  mistresses  —  whom  he  had 
the  grace  not  to  name  —  in  short,  of  all 
those  who  had  been  nearest  and  dearest  to 
him ;  and  he  gave  him  to  understand  that 
his  turn  had  long  since  come,  and  that  the 
Reaper  stood  waiting,  sickle  in  hand,  for 
his  harvest.  And  the  king,  listening  to 
these  ghastly  warnings,  reflected  with  a 
keen  sense  of  dread  that  he  was  at  that 
time  in  his  sixty -third  year  —  a  period  re- 
garded as  one  of  unusual  fatality  to  men  of 
his  mode  of  life. 

The  year  1774  came  round,  bringing 
with  it  several  happenings  that  served  to 


§ 

R 

1 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN 


161 


upset  the  equanimity  of  the  sovereign  and 

of  the  courtesan  to  whom  he  clung  closer 

and  closer  as  the  months  rolled  on.     Early 

in  the  year  the  Genoese  ambassador,  whom 

the  king  was  accustomed  to  see  every  day 

of  his    life,  died    suddenly. 

D'Aimentieres    followed 

him  to  the  grave  within  a 

very  brief  time,  and  shortly 

afterwards  the  Abbe  de  la 

Ville,  Choiseul's  old  enemy, 

on  coming  to  Versailles  to 

thank    King    Louis    for    a 

political  appointment  which 

he    had   given   him,    was 

stricken  with  apoplexy  and 

died    under   his   very   eyes. 

Lastly,  his  old   friend   and 

associate,    the    Marquis    de 

Chouvlain,  fell  dead  at   his  feet  during  a 

game   of  picquet. 

It  was,  therefore,  with  his  always  super- 
stitious mind  filled  with  all  manner  of 
sinister  forebodings  that  the  king  took  his 
seat  in  the  midst  of  a  brilliant  throng  of 

courtiers  to  hear  the   last  of  the  Lenten 

11 


Zamore. 


162       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

sermons  preached  by  the  same  young  abbe 
whose  warning  voice  had  awakened  in  his 
heart  the  terrors  of  death  and  of  the  life  to 
come  scarcely  a  year  before.  From  his 
place  in  the  pulpit  this  brave  young  apostle 
of  truth  looked  down  into  the  royal  pew, 
and,  fixing  his  eyes  upon  his  sovereign, 
addressed  him  directly,  as  was  the  custom 
at  that  time  :  "  Yet  forty  days,  sire,  and 
Nineveh  shall  be  overthrown."  The  king 
turned  pale,  and  slowly  and  solemnly  the 
preacher  again  enunciated  the  awful  menace 
of  the  Prophet.  Then,  growing  fervidly 
eloquent  as  he  developed  his  subject,  he 
compared  Paris  to  Nineveh,  denounced  the 
infidelity  of  the  age,  the  luxury  and  wan- 
tonness in  high  places,  and  urged  on  all  the 
need  of  immediate  repentance  and  purer, 
higher  living.  Finally,  speaking  himself 
with  the  voice  of  the  real  Prophet,  he 
solemnly  warned  the  king  and  all  his 
wanton  court  that  without  repentance  on 
their  part  "the  evil  otherwise  too  surely 
coming  on  France  could  never  be  averted." 
And  the  king  listened  with  increasing 
pallor,  sick  with  a  nameless  terror,  as  one 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN  163 

who  saw  in  a  vision  the  reign  of  blood  and 
terror  and  the  gleam  of  the  executioner's 
knife  under  which  his  successors  were  to 
pay  the  penalty  for  the  sins  of  generations 
of  Bourbons. 

It  was,  therefore,  with  minds  full  of  dis- 
mal forebodings  that  the  king  and  his  mis- 
tress entered  upon  the  month  of  April, 
1774,  the  month  in  which  the  Almanac  de 
Liege  for  that  year  had  already  announced 
that  "  a  great  lady  who  played  a  role  at  a 
foreign  court  would  cease  to  do  so." 

The  king  was  moody  and  melancholy  in 
the  extreme,  and  spoke  frequently  about 
his  sickly  state  of  health,  the  possibility  of 
death,  and  —  what  seemed  to  disturb  him 
more  than  all  the  rest  —  the  frightful 
account  he  would  have  to  render  to  the 
Supreme  Being  for  the  employment  of  the 
life  which  had  been  given  him  in  this 
world. 

The  Favorite,  who,  like  all  women  of 
her  class,  was  intensely  superstitious,  said 
again  and  again :  "  I  shall  be  glad  when 
this  nasty  month  of  April  has  passed,"  and 
the  king  declared  that  he  should  not  know 


164       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

an  easy  moment  until  after  the  forty  days 
predicted  by  the  Abbe  de  Beauvais. 

As  the  days  went  on,  the  king's  melan- 
choly increased,  and  his  mistress,  realizing 
that  it  behooved  her  to  drag  him  from  the 
depths  of  his  despair,  lest  religious  melan- 
cholia should  take  possession  of  his  mind, 
organized  a  little  pleasure  trip  to  Trianon 
for  the  closing  days  of  the  month.  They 
reached  that  charming  retreat  on  the  26th, 
and  on  the  following  day  His  Majesty 
complained  of  headache  and  severe  pains, 
and  was  unable  to  follow  the  chase  on 
horseback.  He  returned  from  the  hunt  in 
a  carriage,  and  at  once  sought  repose  in  the 
Favorite's  apartments,  believing  that  he 
was  suffering  from  an  attack  of  acute 
indigestion. 

Historians  differ  as  to  the  origin  of  the 
king's  malady.  The  Abbe  Badeau  relates 
that  on  the  day  of  his  arrival  at  Trianon 
the  king  noticed  a  very  pretty  little  girl 
who  was  gathering  grass  for  her  cow. 
Coming  over  to  her  he  lifted  up  her  head- 
dress and  hair,  and  found  that  she  had  very 
fine  eyes,  and  it  occurred  to  him  that  she 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN  165 

would  look  very  odd  if  dressed  in  the  garb 
of  a  fine  lady.  The  young  girl  was  accord- 
ingly dressed  like  a  lady  in  court  apparel, 
and  her  face  covered  with  rouge  and 
patches.  In  this  garb  she  supped  and 
drank  with  the  king,  and  the  next  day  fell 
ill  of  smallpox  and  died.  Other  historians 
speak  of  the  daughter  of  the  gardener  at 
Trianon  and  of  a  young  girl  who  had  been 
brought  to  the  Pare  aux  Cerfs  at  the  king's 
desire.  The  truth  is  that  at  that  time 
there  was  an  epidemic  of  smallpox  in  the 
neighborhood,  and  the  king  very  naturally 
fell  a  victim  to  it. 

During  the  day  the  king's  malady  grew 
worse,  and  in  the  night  he  sent  for  his  prin- 
cipal physician,  Lemonier,  who  found  him 
feverish,  but  showing  no  symptoms  of  a 
nature  to  cause  uneasiness.  The  Favorite, 
dreading  more  than  anything  else  the  awful 
fear  of  death  which  came  crowding  into  the 
heart  of  her  lover  with  every  attack  of  ill- 
ness, urged  him  to  remain  at  Trianon  and 
allow  her  to  nurse  him,  without  sending 
word  to  the  royal  family.  The  king  con- 
sented to  this,  but,  in  the  mean  time,  news 


of  his  indisposition  reached  Versailles,  and 
the  dauphin  hastened  to  despatch  to  his 
grandfather's  aid  the  surgeon  La  Martiniere, 
who  he  knew  exercised  a  strong  influence 
over  the  king  and  who  was  also  an  enemy 
of  Du  Barry's. 

La  Martiniere  reached  Trianon  on  the 
28th  of  April,  and,  being  a  man  of  strong 
mind  and  imperative  habits  of  speech,  had 
no  difficulty  in  prevailing  upon  the  vacil- 
lating king  to  set  out  at  once  for  Versailles. 
He  himself  supervised  the  preparations  for 
the  journey,  and  under  his  direction  the 
king  was  lifted  from  his  couch  to  a  carriage 
and  driven  to  Versailles,  where  he  was 
immediately  put  to  bed.  The  members  of 
his  family,  including  his  daughters  and  the 
dauphin,  came  at  once  to  see  him  ;  but  after 
a  very  brief  conversation  with  each  he  sent 
them  away  for  the  night,  and  spent  the  rest 
of  the  evening  with  Madame  L)u  Barry. 
The  next  day  the  doctors,  who  were  still 
ignorant  of  the  nature  of  his  malady, 
prescribed  three  bleedings,  which  left  the 
patient  in  an  enfeebled  condition,  and  un- 
doubtedly did  much  to  hasten  his  death. 


THE   WAGES   OF   SIN  169 

The  next  day,  the  30th,  one  of  the  doctors, 
drawing  near  to  the  king  with  a  wax  candle, 
discovered  on  his  cheeks  and  forehead  red 
spots  in  which  pimples  were  already  begin- 
ning to  form,  and  knew  at  once  that  the 
disease  with  which  he  was  afflicted  was 
smallpox.  Very  much  relieved  at  having 
actually  learned  the  nature  of  his  complaint, 
the  physicians  announced  their  discovery  in 
tones  that  were  so  re-assuring  that  it  was 
generally  believed  at  court  that  the  king's 
illness  meant  only  a  ten  days'  confinement 
to  his  room.  Bourdeau,  however,  Madame 
Du  Barry's  physician,  shook  his  head  doubt- 
ingly  when  the  news  was  brourht  to  him, 
and  exclaimed  :  "  Smallpox  at  sixty -four 
with  a  constitution  like  the  king's  is  a 
terrible  disease  ! " 

And  now  outside  the  door  of  the  sick 
room  began  a  fierce  struggle  between  the 
two  rival  parties  of  the  court.  The  party 
that  rallied  about  Madame  Du  Barry  made 
every  effort  to  push  into  the  sick  room  the 
woman  whom  the  king  loved,  in  order  that 
the  impression  might  prevail  that  her  influ- 
ence with  him  was  still  paramount. 


170       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

The  anti- Barry ites,  on  the  contrary,  cried 
out  against  the  continuance  of  the  scandal, 
demanded  that  the  sacrament  should  be 
administered,  and  called  upon  the  pious 
Monsieur  de  Beaumont  to  follow  the  ex- 
ample of  the  Bishop  of  Soisons  who,  thirty 
years  before,  when  the  king  was  thought  to 
be  mortally  ill  at  Metz,  drove  from  his 
side  his  then  mistress,  the  Duchesse  de 
Chateauroux. 

"  Politics  makes  strange  bedfellows,"  and 
so  it  happened  that  in  "  this  jobbing  and  this 
trafficking  in  the  conscience  of  the  king," 
as  the  Cardinal  de  Luymes  called  it,  we 
find  the  devotees  and  the  Jesuits  banding 
together  to  prevent  the  king  from  receiving 
communion,  while  the  Choiseul  party  of 
philosophers  and  sceptics  are  in  league  to 
compel  the  Archbishop  of  Paris  to  admin- 
ister it. 

On  the  2d  of  INI  ay,  the  archbishop 
arrived  from  Paris,  bringing  with  him 
the  sacrament,  and  hesitating  between  his 
conscience,  which  demanded  of  him  the 
expulsion  of  the  Favorite,  and  a  sense  of 
gratitude  for  the  services  which  that  Favor- 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN  171 

ite  had  rendered  to  his  party  by  the  over- 
throw of  Choiseul  and  the  elevation  of 
D'Aiguillon.  Before  the  arrival  of  the 
archbishop,  Richelieu,  D'Aiguillon,  and 
Madame  Du  Barry  held  a  conference  in 
which  it  was  decided  to  do  their  best  to 
prevent  the  administration  of  the  sacra- 
ment. The  king's  daughter,  Madame 
Adelaide,  was  easily  won  over  to  their  side 
by  the  doctors  of  the  Du  Barry  party  who 
warned  her  that  to  even  propose  the  sacra- 
ment might  easily  give  the  patient  his 
death  blow.  Therefore  the  Due  de  Rich- 
elieu met  the  archbishop  as  he  was  about 
to  enter  the  king's  ante-chamber,  and  im- 
plored him  not  to  cause  the  death  of  their 
sovereign  by  what  he  termed,  with  charac- 
teristic flippancy,  a  "  theological  proposi- 
tion." Then,  with  the  graceful  cynicism 
which  so  well  became  him,  he  offered  to 
make  his  own  confession  to  the  prelate, 
promising  to  regale  him  with  such  a  collec- 
tion of  sins  as  he  had  not  listened  to  in 
many  a  year.  Becoming  serious  again, 
he  represented  to  the  archbishop  that  to 
send  away  the  Favorite  was  to  insure  the 


172       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

triumph  of  Choiseul,  and  that  to  injure 
the  woman  who  was  a  friend  was  also  to 
serve  the  faction  that  had  always  been  out- 
spoken in  its  enmity  to  the  ecclesiastics. 
As  a  final  argument,  he  repeated  to  him 
what  Madame  Du  Barry  had  said  to  him 
the  night  before :  "  Let  the  archbishop 
leave  us  alone,  and  he  shall  have  a  cardi- 
nal's hat.  I  will  take  care  of  that,  and  will 
answer  for  it." 

The  result  of  the  Due  de  Richelieu's 
logical  and  convincing  eloquence  was  that 
the  archbishop  entered  the  sick  room, 
remained  there  for  about  a  quarter  of  an 
hour,  and  then  went  away  without  speak- 
ing about  the  sacrament.  The  king  was 
greatly  reassured  by  his  silence  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  Eucharist,  and  demanded  that 
Madame  Du  Barry  should  be  summoned 
at  once  to  his  presence.  When  she  arrived, 
he  kissed  her  beautiful  arms  and  hands  with 
a  greater  degree  of  pleasure  than  he  had 
shown  toward  her  since  the  beginning  of 
his  illness. 

Disappointed  but  still  undaunted,  the 
Choiseul  faction  turned  to  the  Cardinal  de 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN  173 

la  Roche-Aymon,  and  urged  him  to  pro- 
pose the  sacrament.  By  this  time  they 
had  rallied  to  their  support  many  of  the 
more  devout  of  the  clergy,  among  them 
the  Bishop  of  Car- 
cassonne, who 
appealed  to 
the  cardi- 
nal, in  the 
name  of  the 
holy  cross, 
not  to  allow 
King  Louis  to 
pass  out  of  the 
world  without 
being  anointed, 
and  called  upon 
him  to  so  deport 
himself  in  the  sick  chamber 
that  the  king  should,  before 
he  died,  show  an  example  of  repentance  to 
his  country  which  he  had  scandalized. 

As  a  result  of  the  great  influence  thus 
brought  to  bear  on  him,  the  Archbishop  of 
Paris  visited  the  king  on  the  3d  of  May, 
and  there  held  a  long  conversation  with 


174       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

him,  the  result  of  which  was  that  in  the 
evening  when  Jeanette  Du  Barry,  whom  he 
had  sent  for  a  few  hours  before,  entered 
his  chamber,  radiant  in  the  belief  that 
her  hold  on  him  was  as  strong  as  ever,  he 
beckoned  her  to  his  side  and  whispered  : 
"  Madame,  I  am  very  sick ;  I  know  what 
I  have  to  do ;  I  do  not  want  to  begin 
over  again  the  scene  at  Metz,  and  there- 
fore we  must  part.  Go  to  Ruel,  to 
Monsieur  D'Aiguillon's ;  and  be  sure  that 
I  shall  always  feel  for  you  the  tenderest 
friendship." 

A  moment  after  she  had  gone  weeping 
from  his  presence,  he  called  for  her  in  a 
voice  that  showed  he  was  beginning  to 
become  delirious.  "  Ah  !  she  is  gone,"  he 
said  sadly,  when  he  realized  that  she  was 
no  longer  in  the  room.  "  Then  we  must 
go,  too  — at  least  we  must  pray  to  Saint 
Gene  vie  ve." 

The  reign  of  Jeanette  Du  Barry  had 
ended.  And  with  it  had  ended,  too,  the 
dynasty  of  left-handed  queens  of  France, 
which  began  with  Diane  de  Poictiers,  and 
perished  from  off  the  face  of  the  earth 


Alone  with  the  King. 


THE   WAGES   OF  SIN  177 

when  the  last  of  the  line  was  thrust  from 
the  royal  bedchamber. 

But  if  the  end  of  the  Du  Barry  reign 
had  been  commonplace,  in  what  terms  shall 
we  characterize  the  final  passing  of  Louis 
XV,  known  to  his  subjects  of  half  a  century 
before  as  Louis  the  Well  Beloved,  and  now 
stretched  upon  his  gorgeous  bed  with  the 
hand  of  death  upon  him  and  his  mind  a 
prey  to  the  most  awful  terrors  ? 

Just  one  week  has  passed  since  he  turned 
his  back  upon  his  mistress  and  cried  in  his 
extremity  for  the  consolations  of  the  Church. 
In  1744,  when  he  was  ill  at  Metz,  six  thou- 
sand prayers  for  his  recovery  were  ordered 
at  Notre  Dame  by  devout  subjects.  In 
1757,  at  the  time  of  the  assault  upon  his 
life  by  Damiens,  only  six  hundred  were 
called  for,  and  now  as  he  lies  here  at  Ver- 
sailles, with  the  death  agony  upon  him,  only 
three  pious  souls  have  asked  that  the 
prayers  of  the  Church  be  said  for  him  in 
the  great  cathedral  in  Paris. 

Torn  by  the  terrors  of  a  reproaching 
conscience,  he  has  summoned  the  priests  to 
his  bedside,  and  they  have  performed  their 

12 


178       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

holy  office.  But  even  at  the  moment  of 
receiving  absolution  at  their  hands,  he  clings 
to  the  idea  of  ruling  by  divine  right,  and 
though  the  cardinal  announces  that  His 
Majesty  repents  of  any  scandals  that  his 
conduct  may  have  occasioned  in  his  king- 
dom, he  qualifies  it  by  adding  that  the 
king  considers  himself  responsible  for  his 
conduct  to  God  alone. 

By  nature  intensely  superstitious,  he  de- 
mands that  the  clergy  shall  remain  with 
him  in  the  pestilential  sick  room  from 
which  all  save  his  daughters  and  a  few 
other  devoted  souls  have  long  since  fled  in 
terror.  During  the  few  hours  of  life  that 
remain  to  him,  he  would  rather  listen  to 
the  prayers  of  the  religious  faith  to  which 
he  has  turned  in  his  hour  of  anguish,  than 
permit  his  mind  to  dwell  on  the  ignoble 
life  of  vice  and  selfishness,  of  sins  committed, 
and  good  undone,  that  is  fast  drawing  to  its 
pitiful  close. 

Little  as  we  may  envy  this  Bourbon  king 
the  physical  sufferings  which  mark  his  end, 
we  cannot  help  feeling  that  they  must  be 
light  indeed  compared  with  the  agony  of 


THE   WAGES   OF   SIN  179 

remorse  bred  by  the  thoughts  that  come 
crowding  upon  him,  despite  his  efforts  to 
fix  his  mind  on  the  consolations  that  reli- 
gion extends  to  him.  He  must  remember 
that  "  the  well-beloved  "  of  fifty  years  ago 
has  not  of  late  dared  to  show  his  face  in 
his  own  capital  for  fear  of  mockery  and 
insult.  He  must  remember  what  France 
was  in  the  days  of  his  predecessor,  and  what 
she  is  now,  with  her  peasantry  ground  down 
under  the  heel  of  the  most  atrocious  politi- 
cal system  ever  known,  her  soldiers  sent  to 
far-off  climes  to  be  butchered  in  useless 
warfare,  her  colonies  gone,  her  prestige  van- 
ished, and  want,  shame,  and  rebellion  stalk- 
ing her  streets.  He  has  often  wondered 
cynically  how  his  uncouth,  stupid  grandson 
will  contrive  to  bear  up  under  the  kingly 
crown  for  which  he  is  predestined.  Can 
he  think  of  him  now  without  a  prophetic 
glimpse  of  the  axe  flashing  across  his 
troubled  vision  ?  Above  all  else  that  is  pass- 
ing through  his  mind,  sharper  than  the  stings 
of  conscience,  more  solemn  than  the  pray- 
ers of  the  Church,  ring  the  awful  words  of 
the  Prophet  as  they  fell  from  the  lips  of  the 


180       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

Abbe  Beauvais  in  the  court  chapel :  "  Forty 
days  yet,  sire,  and  Nineveh  shall  be  over- 
thrown." The  fortieth  day  has  come  and 
is  drawing  to  a  close.  Already  the  shad- 
ows are  deepening  in  the  chamber  whose 
splendors  are  a  mockery  to  the  foul  disease 
that  has  laid  this  mighty  sovereign  low.  A 
candle  has  been  lighted  and  placed  in  the 
embrasure  of  one  of  the  tall,  sumptuously 
curtained  windows  that  looks  out  upon  a 
marble  courtyard.  Hundreds  of  eyes  are 
watching  that  candle  from  without,  for  it  is 
known  throughout  the  palace  that  so  long 
as  the  king  lives  it  will  burn. 

It  is  late  in  the  afternoon,  and  the  fortieth 
day  is  almost  passed,  when  of  a  sudden  the 
light  in  the  window  of  the  death  chamber 
is  extinguished,  and  the  courtiers  come 
pouring  out  of  the  rooms  where  they  have 
been  waiting,  and,  with  a  noise  that  is  abso- 
lutely like  thunder,  rush  through  the  corri- 
dors and  down  the  great  staircases  to  the 
chamber  in  which  the  new  king,  Louis 
XVI,  and  Marie  Antoinette  stand  waiting 
for  their  reign  to  begin.  At  the  feet  of  the 
new  sovereign  the  courtiers  make  their  first 


THE  WAGES   OF  SIN  181 

obeisance,  then  rise  and  hurry  away  from 
the  house  of  death  in  which  the  loathsome 
body  of  him  who  was  once  the  hope  of 
France,  Louis  the  Well  Beloved,  lies  unat- 
tended, save  by  a  few  of  the  minor  clergy 
and  some  menial  attendants  who  must  pay 
with  their  lives  for  their  fidelity. 

Late  at  night  the  body,  attended  by  a 
scanty  escort,  is  borne  at  a  quick  trot 
through  crowds  of  contemptuous  Parisians 
who  line  both  sides  of  the  road  all  the  way 
to  the  Abbey  of  St.  Denis,  where  it  is 
hastily  thrown  into  a  vault. 

It  is  a  dark  and  awful  picture,  this  final 
passing  of  the  French  king.  There  is  one 
gleam  of  tenderness,  however,  bright  with 
the  reflection  of  past  glory,  that  falls  across 
his  bier  as  it  is  carried  with  irreverent  haste 
through  the  gates  of  Versailles.  A  grizzled 
veteran  of  the  old  wars  shoulders  his  mus- 
ket and  brings  his  hand  to  salute,  as  the  last 
honor  that  he  can  pay  to  his  dead  king. 
"  After  all,"  murmurs  the  vieux  moustache, 
sympathetically,  "  he  was  at  Fontenoy." 


CHAPTER   IX 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S    REIGN 


Long 


HE  king  is  dead  ! 
live  the  king ! " 

"  God  help  and  pro- 
tect us !  We  are  too 
young  to  reign  1 " 

Such,  we  are  told,  was 
the  beginning  of  the 
reign  of  Louis  XVI  and  Marie  Antoinette. 
That  the  young  queen  lost  no  time  in 
carrying  out  her  oft-repeated  threat  to  dis- 
miss the  Favorite  from  court  the  very 
moment  it  should  be  in  her  power  to  do 
so,  is  evidenced  from  the  following  letter, 
placed  in  Madame  Du  Barry's  hands  by  a 
messenger  the  day  after  the  body  of  Louis 
XV  had  been  borne  at  a  rapid  pace  from 
Versailles  to  St.  Denis,  and  there  thrust, 
with  scant  ceremony,  into  the  tomb. 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN      185 

VERSAILLES,  May  12th,  1774. 

I  hope,  madame,  that  you  will  not  have  any 
doubts  as  to  all  the  pain  I  feel  at  being  obliged  to 
announce  to  you  that  you  are  forbidden  to  appear 
at  court ;  but  I  am  obliged  to  carry  out  the  orders 
of  the  king,  who  wishes  me  to  impress  on  you  that 
his  intention  is,  not  to  allow  you  to  come  there  till 
there  is  a  fresh  order  made  by  him.  His  Majesty, 
at  the  same  time,  is  kind  enough  to  permit  you  to 
go  and  see  your  aunt  in  the  Abbey  of  Pont-aux- 
Dames,  and  I  am  going,  for  that  reason,  to  write 
to  the  abbess  in  order  that  you  may  not  experience 
any  difficulty  in  the  matter.  You  will  be  good 
enough  to  acknowledge  the  receipt  of  this  letter 
through  the  person  who  brings  it  to  you,  so  that  I 
may  be  able  to  assure  His  Majesty  of  the  fact  that 
I  have  carried  out  his  orders. 

I  have  the  honor  to  be,  with  respect,  madame, 
Your  very  humble  and  very  obedient  servant, 

DE  LA  VRILLIERE. 

Marie  Antoinette's  defenders  claim  that 
she  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  expulsion 
of  Du  Barry,  and  lay  great  stress  on  the 
fact  that  within  comparatively  recent  years 
there  has  been  found,  in  the  archives  of  the 
Prefecture  of  Police,  an  entry  which  shows 
that  this  order  was  entered  there  on  the 


186       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

9th  of  May,  1774,  the  day  before  the  king's 
death,  and  the  inference  is,  supported  by 
certain  corroborative  testimony,  that  the 
king  desired  to  have  her  put  away  for  a 
time,  because  she  knew  too  many  state 
secrets.  This  is  not  unlikely,  when  we 
consider  the  absolute  indifference  of  Louis 
XV  to  the  feelings  of  every  one  about  him, 
even  of  those  whom  he  believed  that  he 
loved.  His  grandson,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  of  an  easy-going  disposition,  and  it 
is  scarcely  probably  that  he  would  have 
adopted  such  harsh  measures  in  regard  to 
a  woman  who  had  enjoyed  the  love  and 
confidence  of  his  grandfather  and  prede- 
cessor. The  matter  is  touched  upon,  how- 
ever, in  a  manner  that  should  dispose  of  all 
doubt,  in  a  letter  sent  by  the  young  queen 
to  her  empress  mother  to  announce  the 
death  of  Louis  XV,  and  in  which  she  says  : 
"  The  public  expected  great  changes  in  a 
moment !  The  king  has  limited  himself  to 
sending  the  creature  away  to  a  convent, 
and  to  driving  from  the  court  everything 
which  is  connected  with  that  scandal." 
There  is  something  almost  like  a  note  of 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     187 

warning  in  the  words  uttered  by  Du  Barry 
herself  on  receipt  of  the  message  which 
sent  her  into  exile  : 

"  A  nice  reign  indeed,  that  starts  with  a 
lettre  de  cachet !  "  she  exclaimed,  with  a  few 
choice  blasphemies,  to  the  messenger  who 
has    brought    her    the    duke's 
letter.    She  herself,  to  do  her 
justice,    had   never,    so 
far  as  authentic  his- 
tory asserts,  asked 
for  a  single  lettre  de 
cachet   during  the 
whole    five    years 
of  her  reign,  and  this 
in  itself  is  a  circumstance    The  Du  L>arry  coffee  ^ 
that  redounds  to  the  credit 
of  this  "  unmalignant,  not  wholly  unpitiable 
thing,"  as  Carlisle  has  called  her,  especially 
when  we  consider  the  fact  that  during  the 
whole  period  of  her  reign  she  was  the  tar- 
get for  every  sort  of  attack  that  feminine 
jealousy,  court  intrigue,  or  the  political  am- 
bition of  her  enemies  could  devise.     Her 
predecessor,  the  Marquise  de  Pompadour, 
left  a  very  different  record  behind  her. 


188       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

Jean  Du  Barry,  although  included  in 
the  same  order,  was  too  smart  to  be  caught. 
The  instant  that  he  learned  of  the  king's 
death,  he  consulted  a  friend,  named  Goy, 
as  to  what  he  should  do,  and  this  gentle- 
man, who  appears  to  have  possessed  a  high 
degree  of  common  sense,  replied  that  there 
was  nothing  left  for  him  but  the  jewel  case 
and  the  post-horses. 

"  What !  "  demanded  the  Roue,  with  an 
assumption  of  dignity,  "  do  you  advise 
me  to  fly  ?  " 

"  Well,"  replied  his  friend,  "  you  can 
alter  it  to  the  post-horses  and  the  jewel 
case,  if  it  sounds  better." 

The  Roue  took  this  advice,  and  in  a  few 
hours  was  well  on  his  way  to  Germany, 
which  country  he  reached  in  safety,  thanks 
to  the  fact  that  the  period  ante-dated  that  of 
the  telegraph  and  telephone.  Two  years 
later,  he  returned  to  Toulouse,  married 
again,  and  for  some  time  led  what  must 
have  seemed  a  very  monotonous  life  to  one 
accustomed  to  such  high  intrigues  as  those 
that  had  previously  engrossed  his  attention. 
It  was  his  boast  that,  during  his  sister-in- 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     189 

law's  reign,  he  had  "  flung  into  the  pave- 
ments of  Paris  "  eighteen  million  of  francs  ; 
but  that  did  not  prevent  him  from  harass- 
ing her  constantly  for  money  until  the 
last  days  of  her  life. 

When  Louis  XV  died,  one  of  the  cords 
—  and  there  were  not  many  of  them  left,  - 
that  had  bound  the  French  people  to  the 
monarchy  snapped  in  twain.  By  a  curious 
coincidence,  on  the  same  day,  and  almost  at 
the  very  moment  of  his  death,  news  of 
the  passage  of  the  Boston  Port  Act  in  the 
English  Parliament  was  first  received  in 
this  country.  This  bill  was  a  measure  of 
retaliation  for  the  Boston  Tea  Party  of  the 
previous  December  16th,  and  by  its  provi- 
sions the  port  of  Boston  was  to  remain 
closed  to  ships  of  all  kinds  until  its  inhabi- 
tants should  reimburse  the  East  Indian 
Company  for  the  loss  of  the  tea  which  had 
gone  to  flavor  the  waters  of  the  harbor. 

The  receipt  of  the  news  that  the  obsti- 
nate old  English  king  was  still  determined 
to  discipline  the  great  lusty  colony  like  a 
refractory  child,  was  marked  by  an  exhibi- 
tion of  feeling  that  convinced  statesmen 


like  Adams,  Hancock  and  their  peers  that 
a  revolution  of  the  thirteen  colonies  was 
one  of  the  absolute  certainties  of  the  near 
future. 

So  it  happened  that  while  Louis  XVI, 
with  his  queen  at  his  elbow,  was  beginning, 
with  a  spiteful  lettre  de  cachet,  a  reign  that 
was  destined  to  end  in  blood  and  ignominy, 
the  men  who  were  dominant  in  the  Ameri- 
can colonies  were  beginning  to  prepare  for 
the  great  seven  years  struggle  that  destiny 
had  marked  out  for  them. 

As  for  Madame  Du  Barry,  her  reign  hav- 
ing ended  with  that  of  the  king,  she  pro- 
ceeded to  the  abbey  designated  in  her  lettre 
de  cachet,  and  Marie  Antoinette  began  her 
reign  as  the  lawful  queen  of  France. 

If  we  marvel  at  the  way  in  which  Louis 
XV  and  his  court  went  dancing,  drinking 
on  toward  the  deluge  that  the  Pompadour 
had  predicted,  we  marvel  all  the  more  at 
the  way  in  which  his  grandson  and  his  light- 
headed young  queen  bore  the  sceptre  of 
government. 

Neither  one  of  them  seems  to  have  had 
any  sense  whatever  of  impending  disaster, 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     193 

though  even  the  old  King  Louis  had  often 
remarked,  "  When  I  am  gone,  I  should  like 
very  much  to  know  how  Berry  [the  family 
name  for  the  dauphin,  whom  he  thoroughly 
despised]  will  contrive  to  stand  up  under 
it  all,"  meaning  the  republican  element 
which  he  himself  had  found  it  so  difficult 
to  cope  with. 

It  was  not  merely  that  they  were  "  too 
young  to  reign,"  they  were  too  ignorant  to 
be  intrusted  with  such  an  awful  responsi- 
bility as  that  of  the  government  of  the 
kingdom  of  France. 

Louis  XVI  was  as  much  unlike  his  noble- 
looking,  aristocratic  grandfather  as  it  was 
possible  for  a  man  to  be.  His  manners 
were  awkward,  his  voice  harsh  and  uncul- 
tured, his  clothing  soiled  and  untidy,  and 
his  mind  dull,  and  his  will  weak  and  vacil- 
lating. His  appearance  betrayed  his  habits 
of  gluttony,  for  he  was  obese  of  figure  and 
heavy  of  feature.  When  he  dined  in  pub- 
lic, in  deference  to  the  ancient  French  cus- 
tom which  decreed  that  the  inviolable  right 
of  the  people  of  France  was  to  see  their  sov- 
ereign eat,  he  gorged  himself  to  an  extent 

13 


194       THE  STORY  OF  DU  BARRY 

that  proved  disgusting  to  those  who  had 
been  used  to  the  elegancies  of  Louis  XV 
and  his  associates.  He  devoted  himself 
chiefly  to  the  chase,  and  to  amateur  lock- 
making  and  map-drawing,  and  kept  a  diary 
which  is  very  interesting  reading.  The 
day  in  which  he  killed  nothing  was  deemed 
worse  than  wasted,  and  left  no  record  be- 
hind it  save  the  single  word  "  Nothing " 
scrawled  in  the  diary. 

So  unfavorable  was  the  impression  that 
he  created  in  the  minds  of  his  subjects  that 
his  advisers  deemed  it  prudent  to  counter- 
act it  by  means  of  the  suggestion,  artfully 
circulated,  that  after  all  such  a  simple  and 
frugal  king  was  formed  for  his  whole  peo- 
ple rather  than  for  his  court  alone. 

And  yet  some  gleam  of  the  impending 
axe  may  have  crossed  even  his  dull,  uncom- 
prehending brain,  for  we  are  told  that  at  his 
coronation,  at  the  very  moment  when  the 
crown  was  placed  upon  his  brow,  he  raised 
his  hand  suddenly  to  relieve  his  head  for 
the  moment  of  the  weight,  and  exclaimed 
petulantly  :  "  It  hurts  me  !  " 

As  to  the  real  character  of  the  young 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     195 

queen,  it  is  not  an  easy  matter  to  get  at 
the  truth,  so  fierce  has  been  the  abuse  of 
her  detractors,  so  fulsome  the  panegyrics 
of  her  supporters.  With  the  question  of 
her  morals,  we  need  not  meddle,  nor  should 
we  lend  a  too  ready  ear  to  the  stories  that 
were  circulated  in  regard  to  her  —  stories 
of  the  kind  that  always  will  be  circulated 
so  long  as  women  of  youth,  beauty,  and 
high  spirits  shall  be  exposed  to  the  fierce 
white  light  of  public  fame. 

That  Marie  Antoinette  proved  a  far 
greater  calamity  to  the  French  people  than 
had  Madame  Du  Barry,  is  a  fact  that  it 
would  be  difficult  to  gainsay,  nor  should 
the  circumstance  that  she  was  the  legiti- 
mate queen  of  France,  and  not  the  mere 
mistress  of  a  dotard  king,  serve  as  an  ex- 
cuse for  her  follies.  Born  in  the  purple, 
and  having  as  a  mother  the  wisest  of  sov- 
ereigns and  the  most  prudent  of  counsel- 
lors, a  great  deal  more  might  have  been 
expected  of  her  than  of  a  young  woman 
with  no  inheritance  but  beauty,  a  sort 
of  bright  native  wit,  and  unfailing  good 
temper,  who,  transplanted  from  the  shop 


196       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

counter  to  a  seat  which,  though  unlawful, 
was  none  the  less  secure,  on  the  steps  of 
the  throne  of  France,  had  plunged  into 
luxuries  and  extravagances  of  the  sort  that 
have  a  stronger  fascination  than  anything 
else  in  the  world  for  women  of  her  class. 
She  spent  millions  of  the  public  money, 
because  it  was  given  to  her  to  spend,  and 
she  spent  it,  too,  without  asking  herself 
whence  it  came.  It  was  enough  for  her 
that  she  held  the  envied  place  of  Favorite, 
and  as  she  was  not  a  lawful  queen  she 
could  not  take  upon  her  own  shoulders  the 
responsibilities  of  the  kingdom. 

Marie  Antoinette,  however,  came  of  a 
class  in  which  governing  is  as  much  of  a 
trade  as  is  the  profession  of  cooking  in  the 
province  of  Ticino  in  Italian  Switzerland, 
from  which  have  come  the  greatest  cooks 
and  restaurateurs  in  the  world. 

The  French  people  had  the  same  right 
to  the  services  of  their  extravagantly  paid 
queen  that  the  hotel-keeper  has  to  those  of 
the  high  salaried  chef,  nurtured  in  an  at- 
mosphere of  sauces,  as  she  had  been  in  that 
of  the  Austrian  court. 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     197 

But  although  a  brilliant  and  bea.utiful 
figure  in  her  husband's  court,  carrying  her- 
self with  queenly  dignity  when  occasion 
demanded,  and  encouraging,  by  her  patron- 
age, the  arts  of  music,  painting,  and  statu- 
ary, she  was  absolutely  selfish  in  her  pursuit 
of  her  own  enjoyment,  reckless  of  the 
results  of  her  folly,  and  cruelly  vindictive 
in  her  treatment  of  those  who,  like  Du 
Barry,  had  incurred  her  dislike. 

History  has  laid  many  evil  things  at  the 
door  of  the  fallen  Favorite,  and  one  story, 
which  her  enemies  never  tire  of  repeat- 
ing, is  to  the  effect  that  on  one  occasion, 
when  her  royal  lover  was  greatly  exercised 
over  the  partition  of  Poland,  she  inquired 
innocently  :  "  Where  is  Poland  ? "  This 
anecdote  does  not  do  much  credit  to  her 
education,  but  after  all  it  was  not  her 
business,  as  the  king's  mistress,  to  know 
anything  about  Poland.  There  is  some- 
thing far  worse  than  mere  ignorance  on 
the  part  of  one  who  should  have  been  well 
informed,  in  the  query  of  Marie  Antoinette, 
"  Why  do  the  people  cry  for  bread,  when 
they  can  get  such  nice  cakes  for  a  penny  ? " 


198       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

Many  and  interesting  are  the  stories 
related  of  the  young  queen  during  the 
early  years  of  her  reign,  and  with  many  of 
them  we  can  sympathize ;  while  her  impa- 
tience of  the  elaborate  ceremonial  of  court- 
life,  with  its  ponderous  rules  and  etiquette, 
as  burdensome  to  her  as  the  enormous 
coiffure  which  she  was  compelled  to  wear 
on  her  head,  cannot  fail  to  commend  her 
to  us  of  a  simpler,  and,  we  hope,  a  more 
sensible  age.  It  is  pleasant  to  read  of  her 
mockery  of  Madame  de  Noailles,  whose  duty 
it  was  to  follow  her  about  and  remind  her, 
in  low,  respectful  whispers,  of  neglected 
points  of  etiquette.  What  more  entranc- 
ing picture  is  there  than  that  of  this  beau- 
tiful young  queen  lying  prone  on  a  bed  of 
forest  leaves,  and  laughingly  refusing  to 
rise  until  Madame  de  Noailles  should  be 
summoned  to  tell  her  what  particular  form 
of  etiquette  the  rules  of  the  French  court 
prescribed  for  a  dauphiness  who  had  been 
thrown  from  her  donkey. 

Moreover  Marie  Antoinette  will  be  en- 
deared to  Americans  for  all  time  because 
of  the  influence  which  she  used  in  our 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     201 

behalf  during  our  struggle  with  the  mother 
country.  She  helped  to  make  Benjamin 
Franklin,  then  accredited  to  her  husband's 
court,  the  rage  of  Paris,  and  under  the 
spell  of  his  wit  and  diplomacy  espoused  the 
cause  of  the  colonies  with  all  her  heart. 
This  beautiful  queen,  the  chivalrous  Mar- 
quis de  Lafayette,  and  the  American  com- 
missioner, who  was  none  the  less  crafty 
and  adroit  because  of  his  Quaker  garb  and 
unpowdered  locks,  did  a  vast  deal  to  influ- 
ence public  opinion  in  France,  and  that,  in 
its  turn,  brought  over  the  ministry  to  the 
American  side.  The  king,  however,  was 
very  averse  to  having  anything  to  do  with 
the  American  disturbance,  and  even  at  the 
moment  of  signing  the  treaty  with  the 
United  States  of  America,  in  1778,  said: 
"You  will  remember  that  this  is  against 
my  better  judgment." 

That  the  king  viewed  the  matter  rightly 
from  his  own  point  of  view  was  amply 
proved  by  subsequent  events.  For  not 
only  did  his  contributions  of  men  and 
treasure  to  the  American  cause  add  enor- 
mously to  the  great  public  debt  under 


202       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

which  France  was  then  groaning,  but  the 
success  of  our  arms  —  aided  as  we  were  at 
a  most  critical  moment  by  the  French  — 
served  to  spread  abroad  through  the  king- 
dom the  seeds  of  democracy.  Soldiers  re- 
turning from  America  told  stories  of  the 
new  land  of  liberty  which  served  only  to 
fan  the  flames  of  discontent,  and  it  is  not 
too  much  to  say  that  one  of  the  greatest 
mistakes  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI,  so  far 
as  the  stability  of  the  monarchy  was  con- 
cerned, was  his  taking  part  in  a  costly  war 
which  gained  for  him  the  undying  hatred 
of  England  and  failed  to  secure  for  him 
the  friendship  of  the  new  republic. 

During  the  first  years  of  her  reign,  the 
young  queen  remained  childless,  and  de- 
voted herself  exclusively  to  the  pursuit  of 
pleasure.  In  the  mornings  she  received 
visitors  in  her  bedchamber,  as  Du  Barry 
had  done,  and  was  scarcely  less  particular 
than  the  former  Favorite  in  her  manner  of 

•>v 

exposing  her  charms  to  the  gaze  of  her 
admirers.  In  the  afternoons  she  amused 
herself  with  high  play  at  the  card-tables  or 
in  the  gardens  of  Little  Trianon,  and  in 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN 


203 


the  evenings  she  went  to  masked  balls  and 
late  suppers  in  company  with   the  worst 


libertines   of   the 
part  in  private  the- 
whieh  the  language 
loosest  sort,  lost  great 
sums  of  money 
at  the   gaming 
table,    and,    in 
short,  lived  in 
such     a    man- 
ner  as  seriously   to 
weaken  her  popular- 
ity with  the  French 
people    and    to    alarm 
her  prudent  mother   in 
Vienna.     So  long  as  the 
Empress  Maria  Theresa 

lived  and  Mercy- 

Argenteau 

tained  the  post 

of     Austrian 

ambassador   at 

the   French 

court,    Marie 

Antoinette  re- 


court,  took 
atricals  in 
was  of  the 


re- 


Veritable  night  table  actually  used  by 
Du  Barry  at  Versailles. 


204       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

mained  to  a  certain  extent  under  the 
maternal  control,  and  the  correspondence 
between  the  sovereign  and  the  diplomat,  as 
well  as  that  of  the  mother  and  daughter, 
afford  a  marvellously  interesting  insight  into 
the  history  of  that  period. 

No  less  interesting  is  the  picture  of  court 
life  drawn  by  Mr.  Thomas  E.  Watson  in 
"  The  Story  of  France  "  : 

"  As  Frederick  the  Great  loved  Sans 
Souci,  and  Washington  Mt.  Vernon,  as 
Mirabeau  would  slip  away  on  Sunday  to 
lounge  in  the  rose  gardens  at  Argenteuil, 
and  Napoleon  loved  to  saunter,  hands 
crossed  behind  him,  along  the  quietudes  of 
Malmaison,  —  Marie  Antoinette  sought  to 
create  for  herself  an  ideal  retreat,  an  Eden 
of  the  fancy,  where  she  was  to  find  true 
friendship,  true  happiness,  blissful  repose. 
The  Little  Trianon  was  a  delicious  bit  of 
marble  architecture  built  by  Louis  XV  in 
a  retired  portion  of  the  park  of  Versailles. 
It  was  here  that  he  had  loved  to  lay  aside 
the  trappings  and  formalities  of  royalty  and 
play  the  private  gentleman,  entertaining  a 
few  choice  spirits  in  the  little  palace,  and 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     205 

amusing  himself  with  amateur  farming  and 
flower  culture  in  the  lovely  grounds. 

"  Louis  XVI  gave  Little  Trianon  to  his 
wife,  and  with  the  eager  delight  of  a  child 
she  set  about  making  it  a  paradise.  The 
world  was  ransacked  for  the  finest  trees, 
the  choicest  shrubs,  the  loveliest  flowers. 
The  rarest  skill  was  employed  in  laying 
out  gardens,  lawns,  shrubberies,  walks, 
creating  grottoes,  hills,  lakes  and  winding 
rivers.  No  expense  was  spared  ;  the  queen 
demanded  a  fairy-land,  and  the  gardener 
gave  it ;  the  taxpayers  footed  the  bills,  and 
the  queen  was  in  ecstasies.  The  Little 
Trianon  became  a  gem,  a  marvel  of  beauty, 
which  all  travellers  went  to  see. 

"  Brilliant  parterres,  emerald  stretches  of 
velvet  lawn,  waving  masses  of  luxuriant 
foliage,  glimpses  of  marble  statuary  and 
silvery  waters,  —  all  were  there  to  fascinate 
the  eye  and  kindle  enthusiasm.  Fountains 
sprang  up  in  the  sun,  sparkling  and  dancing 
and  splashing ;  the  rivulet  wound  in  and 
out,  round  and  round,  through  the  garden, 
the  lawn,  the  meadow ;  the  nightingales 
sang  in  the  shadow  of  the  groves ;  the 


206       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

marble  Belvidere  crowned  the  steep ;  and 
upon  the  enchanted  island  which  rose  from 
the  bosom  of  the  lake  rested  the  Temple 
of  Love.  A  model  rustic  village  lined  the 
borders  of  the  lake,  and  there  was  the  mill, 
the  grange,  and  the  manor-house  for  the 
master,  all  complete.  The  dairy  must  not 
be  overlooked,  that  El  Dorado  dairy  where 
Blanchette,  the  cow,  was  milked  by  the 
'  daughter  of  the  Caesars.'  The  milk  ves- 
sels were  of  porcelain,  rested  upon  marble 
slabs,  and  conveyed  Blanchette's  milk  to  a 
churn  of  silver. 

"  In  this  Eden  the  queen  lived  with  a 
select  few  of  the  younger  members  of  the 
nobility.  The  king  himself  was  not  to 
come  unless  invited.  Only  the  few  were 
welcome,  —  only  the  congenial,  the  young, 
the  gallant,  the  gay.  Dull  care  must  not 
enter  here,  nor  gloom,  nor  weariness,  nor 
pain. 

"  In  the  lexicon  of  the  queen's  youth, 
there  was  no  such  word  as  duty.  To 
frolic,  to  feast,  to  dress,  to  outshine  the 
brightest,  to  dazzle  the  eye  of  the  be- 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN     209 

holder,  to  create  a  radiance  in  her  own 
immediate  circle,  to  laugh,  jest,  play  and 
enjoy,  —  was  the  whole  of  her  gospel. 
Such  was  high  life  all  around  her.  Why 
should  n't  she  be  gay  ?  Let  others  talk 
of  public  distress,  prate  of  economy  and 
preach  of  woes  to  come.  It  was  an  old 
song  that  had  been  heard  now  since  the 
good  year  1700  :  '  We  must  amuse  our- 
selves.' On  with  the  dance  ;  on  with  festi- 
vals and  theatricals  ;  on  with  the  horse- 
races, sleigh-rides,  and  lawn-parties  ;  on  to 
the  opera,  the  opera-ball  and  the  opera- 
supper.  Let  us  lose  royally  at  faro,  the 
State  pays ;  let  us  enrich  our  pets,  the 
State  pays ;  let  us  lavish  millions  upon 
Little  Trianon,  the  State  pays.  Let  us 
whisper  over  the  latest  scandal,  and  titter 
as  we  do  so.  Let  us  skate  along  the  con- 
versational surface  as  close  as  we  can  go 
to  the  forbidden  ground  of  the  utterly 
obscene.  Let  us  mock  at  all  things  seri- 
ous, decorous,  and  coldly  prudent !  Such 
was  Marie  Antoinette  before  trouble  sobered 
her  thoughts,  silvered  her  tresses  and  struck 
the  light  out  of  her  life. 


14 


210       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

"  At  Paris,  in  the  Bibliotheque  Nationale, 
you  may  see  a  book  which  speaks  but  too 
convincingly  of  the  true  character  of  the 
unfortunate  queen.  The  cover  is  that  of 
the  Catholic  missal,  for  Marie  Antoinette 
was  a  devoted  Catholic,  and  she  was  faith- 
ful in  her  attendance  at  chapel ;  but  within 
the  sacred  cover  of  this  book  of  worship  is 
enclosed  the  contents  of  an  obscene  novel. 
The  priest  could  only  see  the  cover,  and  he 
would  glorify  God  for  so  devout  a  worship- 
per ;  but  the  bowed  head  of  the  queen  was 
bent  over  a  filthy  love-story,  and  while  the 
priest  talked  of  God,  the  queen  was  reading 
the  history  of  polite  adultery. 

"  Marie  Antoinette  should  be  judged  by 
the  standard  of  her  own  times,  not  by  that 
of  ours.  She  should  be  compared  to  those 
around  her,  not  to  those  around  us.  En- 
vironment is  the  father  of  us  all  —  environ- 
ment and  heredity." 

In  due  course  of  time  a  daughter  was 
born  to  the  queen,  and  afterwards,  in 
October,  1781,  a  son,  and  the  whole  nation 
went  wild  with  delight  because  their  king 
had  an  heir.  Sir  Samuel  Romilly,  who 


MARIE    ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN 

happened  to  be  in  Paris  at  this  time,  was 
saddened  by  the  sight  of  the  swarms  of 
hungry,  ragged,  dirty  people  who  danced 
in  the  public  parks  to  the  music  of  the 
royal  band  to  show  their  delight  at  the 
advent  of  a  child  who  was  to  be  brought 
up  as  a  common  oppressor. 

The  birth  of  this  child  served  to  restore 
for  the  moment  the  popularity  of  the 
young  queen,  which  had  waned  materially 
during  the  half  dozen  years  of  her  reign, 
because  of  her  own  conduct.  Mr.  Watson 
has  given  us  the  picture  of  the  rejoicings 
with  which  the  birth  of  the  little  dauphin 
was  celebrated,  which  is  well  worth  quot- 
ing as  it  shows  us  Louis  XVI  and  his 
Austrian  queen  at  the  one  moment  during 
their  reign  when  they  really  seemed  to  be 
beloved  by  their  subjects. 

"  People  embraced  each  other  in  the 
street,  as  though  the  happiness  of  the  event 
was  personal  to  every  citizen  of  France. 
Addresses  of  congratulation  poured  in  from 
all  the  departments  and  public  bodies. 
Illuminations  lit  up  the  towns  and  cities, 
processions  thronged  the  streets,  loyal  songs 


212       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

were  sung  at  the  theatres  amid  deafening 
applause,  Te  Deums  were  chanted  in  cathe- 
drals, and  melodious  organs  pealed  forth 
their  richest  notes.  All  France  was  glad, 
deliriously  glad.  God  had  given  the  king 
a  son,  and  the  people  would  not  be  left 
without  a  royal  staff  to  lean  upon.  The 
guilds  and  trades-unions  of  Paris  were  as 
exuberant  in  their  manifestations  of  joy  as 
any  place-hunter  of  the  court.  They  spent 
money  freely  to  make  a  fitting  display  at 
Versailles.  Arrayed  in  the  new  uniforms 
of  their  various  organizations  and  accom- 
panied by  bands  of  music,  the  mechanics, 
artificers,  and  tradesmen  of  Paris  marched 
out  to  Versailles  and  paraded  in  the  court 
of  the  palace.  Chimney-sweepers,  ele- 
gantly dressed,  carried  an  ornamented 
chimney  upon  the  top  of  which  was 
perched  a  chimney-sweep  of  the  smallest 
size.  The  butchers  passed  in  review  bear- 
ing a  colossal  beef.  Smiths  hammered 
away  upon  an  anvil ;  shoemakers  made  a 
pretty  pair  of  shoes  for  the  son  of  the  king, 
and  the  tailors  presented  a  tiny  uniform  of 
the  dauphin's  regiment.  For  a  long  time 


"I 

53 


C 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE'S   REIGN      215 

Louis  XVI,  the  happy  father,  who  could 
not  say  *  my  son '  too  often  that  blessed 
day,  stood  on  the  balcony  viewing  the 
parade,  intoxicated  by  the  enthusiasm  which 
prevailed.  No  happier  day  was  his.  King, 
queen  and  people  were  united  then,  drawn 
together  by  the  dimpled  hand  of  a  child. 

"  Amid  all  these  rejoicings  what  spectre 
pushes  its  way  to  the  front,  marring  the 
universal  pleasure  ?  It  is  the  procession  of 
the  worshipful  coffin-makers,  to  whom  it 
had  not  occurred  that  a  hearse  or  a  casket, 
borne  in  procession,  would  not  add  to  the 
exhilaration  of  the  hour.  Old  Princess 
Sophie,  the  king's  aunt,  weak  of  nerves 
and  querulous,  thrilled  with  horror  at  the 
sight,  and  had  the  worshipful  coffin-makers 
put  out  of  the  procession. 

"  The  market-women  of  Paris  came  in  a 
body  to  see  the  queen,  to  congratulate  her. 
These  women  were  dressed  in  black  silk 
gowns,  wore  diamonds,  and  had  their  ad- 
dress inscribed  upon  the  leaves  of  a  fan. 
The  queen  received  these  Dames  of  the 
Hall  most  affably,  and  the  king  dined  them 
in  the  palace.  The  fish- women  also  came, 


216       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

also  gained  access  to  the  queen,  and  made 
three  speeches  of  congratulation,  —  one  to 
the  king,  one  to  the  queen,  and  one  to  the 
child.  A  more  fervent  spirit  of  attachment 
than  that  which  inspired  these  addresses  of 
the  working  people  of  Paris  never  found 
expression.  Gaze  once  more  upon  this 
scene — the  king  on  the  balcony  at  Ver- 
sailles, tears  of  joy  in  his  eyes,  his  heart 
overflowing  with  happiness,  and  around 
him  the  splendid  and  spontaneous  tribute 
of  boundless  affection  laid  at  his  feet  by 
the  laboring  classes  of  Paris.  This  was 
October,  1781. 

"  The  outburst  of  loyalty  and  affection 
was  not  confined  to  Paris  and  Versailles. 
It  prevailed  throughout  the  provinces.  It 
was  universal  and  genuine.  Songs,  danc- 
ings, music,  festivals,  celebrations,  did  not 
cease  till  way  into  January,  1782." 


CHAPTER    X 

IN    RETIREMENT 

ISTORY,  that  is  to 
say  authentic  history, 
has  very  little  to  say 
of  the  fallen  Favorite 
during  the  years  that 
passed  from  the  mo- 
ment when  Louis  XVI 
began  his  ill-fated  reign  with  a  lettre  de 
cachet  until  that  in  which  she  fell  a  victim 
to  the  Reign  of  Terror. 

She  remained  in  the  abbey  until  early 
in  1775,  when  she  was  permitted  to  regain 
her  liberty.  Forbidden  to  live  within  ten 
leagues  of  Paris,  or  the  court,  she  purchased 
the  Chateau  of  Saint  Vrain,  situated  a  few 
miles  from  Artajon  and  consisting  of  a 
handsome  house,  provided  with  chapel, 
stables,  forecourt,  etc.,  and  a  domain  of 


218      THE    STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 


about  one  hundred  and  forty  acres.  This 
property,  which  still  exists,  had  belonged 
to  the  second  son  of  Madame  La  Garde, 
with  whom,  early  in  her  career,  when  she 
was  simply  little  Jeanette  Becu,  she  had 
found  employment  as  lady's  companion. 

Here  she  remained  for 
two  years,  giving  balls  and 
other  entertainments,  re- 
lieving the  necessities  of  the 
poor,  and  enjoying  as  best 
she  could  the  pleasures  of 
French  country  life.  She 
also  founded  two  scholar- 
ships in  a  school  of  art  for 
workmen,  which  her  old 
friend,  M.  de  Sartines,  the 
ex-chief  of  Police,  had  estab- 
lished in  Paris.  The  deed 
for  these  scholarships  bears 
the  date  of  September  21, 
1775,  and  on  the  same  day 
Bodyguard  of  she  purchased,  for  fifty-three 

thousand  francs,  a  house  and 
thirty  acres  of  land,  which  she  presented 
to  her  mother  and  stepfather,  thus  enabling 


IN   RETIREMENT 

them  to  live  in  comfort  for  the  rest  of  their 
days. 

Having  obtained  permission  to  return  to 
Louveciennes,  Madame  Du  Barry  repaired 
to  that  house  with  her  great  retinue  of  ser- 
vants, and  there  lived  for  years  a  life  that 
was  almost  wholly  devoid  of  exciting  inci- 
dent and  was  devoted  largely  to  "charitable 
work  among  her  poorer  neighbors. 

One  of  her  last  appearances  in  the  great 
world  in  which  she  had  once  played  her  part 
was  on  the  occasion  of  the  debut  of  the 
beautiful  Mademoiselle  Contat,  afterwards 
the  Countess  de  Parny,  at  the  Theatre 
Fran^ais.  It  was  a  brilliant  audience  that 
gathered  in  honor  of  this  lovely  young  de- 
butante. Marie  Antionette  was  there  in  the 
royal  box  in  company  with  her  brother,  the 
Emperor  of  Austria,  then  journeying  under 
the  incognito  of  Count  von  Falkenstein. 
With  them,  were  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe, 
the  Countess  de  Polignac,  the  courtly  and 
elegant  Baron  de  Besenval  and  the  Count 
de  Vaudreuil,  who  shared  with  the  tragedian 
Le  Kain  the  distinction  of  possessing  the 
most  courtly  and  gracious  manners  toward 


THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

the  fair  sex  in  all  France.  In  boxes  adjoin- 
ing that  of  the  queen,  were  the  Due  and 
Duchesse  de  Chartres,  in  company  with  the 
fascinating  Mademoiselle  de  Genlis,  whose 
name  the  gossips  associated  with  that  of  the 
duke,  Madame  and  Mademoiselle  de  Pro- 
vence and  the  Countess  d'Artois  —  and  a 
host  of  other  Parisian  exquisites,  while  the 
rest  of  the  audience  was  made  up  of  the 
leading  critics,  poets,  dramatists  and  artists 
of  Paris. 

By  many  in  the  throng  that  clustered 
about  the  royal  box  the  Countess  Du  Barry 
was  recognized,  simply  dressed  and  closely 
veiled,  as  she  passed  along  the  corridor  on 
the  arm  of  the  Due  de  Cosse-Brissac. 
Watchful  eyes  saw  her  afterwards,  still 
veiled  and  hiding  behind  the  thick  silk  cur- 
tains of  her  box,  for  she  had  come  from  her 
lovely  chateau,  not  because  she  desired  to 
be  seen  in  the  gay  world,  but  because  of  her 
deep  interest  in  the  event  of  the  evening. 

Escorted  by  the  duke,  Madame  Du  Barry 
left  the  theatre  before  the  conclusion  of  the 
play,  noticing,  perhaps,  that  she  had  been 
recognized  by  the  royal  party,  and  being 


IN   RETIREMENT  223 

fully  aware  of  the  queen's  antipathy  to  her. 
Indeed  Marie  Antoinette  that  very  evening 
replied  to  her  brother's  question  as  to  the 
identity  of  the  veiled  beauty  that  she  was 
"  that  creature,"  a  term  which  had  pre- 
viously shocked  the  good  sense  and  taste  of 
Maria  Theresa,  when  she  encountered  it,  as 
she  frequently  had,  in  her  daughter's  letters. 

Concerning  this  incident,  Lady  Jackson 
speaks  her  mind  with  her  accustomed  free- 
dom, and  at  the  same  time  relates  how  the 
Austrian  Emperor  proceeded  to  gratify  the 
curiosity  which  had  been  awakened  in  him 
at  the  sight  of  the  famous  Madame  Du 
Barry,  and  the  buzz  of  interest  and  conjec- 
ture that  had  gone  round  the  theatre  the 
moment  she  was  recognized. 

"  The  retired  life  of  '  the  creature '  at 
Louveciennes,"  says  Lady  Jackson,  "  natu- 
rally provoked  comparison  with  that  of  '  the 
creatures '  of  Versailles,  and  was  not  always 
in  favor  of  the  latter.  With  the  Parisian 
public,  the  Favorite  of  the  late  king  was  far 
less  unpopular  than  the  new  favorites  of  the 
queen,  while  at  and  around  Louveciennes, 
she  was  greatly  revered  and  beloved  for  her 


224       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

kindness  of  heart,  the  interest  she  took  in 
the  poor  and  her  extreme  benevolence.  She 
could  not,  on  this  occasion,  have  heard  the 
queen's  petulant  exclamation  or  the  whis- 
pered rebuke  of  the  incognito  Emperor. 

"  On  the  morrow,  however,  she  was  in- 
formed that  the  Counts  von  Falkenstein 
and  Cobenzel  begged  permission  to  pay 
their  respects  to  the  lady  of  Louveciennes, 
and  to  be  allowed  to  walk  through  the  pic- 
turesque grounds  surrounding  the  chateau. 
Madame  Du  Barry  took  much  pride  in  her 
park  and  grounds.  She  was  accustomed  to 
walk  in  them  daily — -often  for  hours  to- 
gether. They  were  charmingly  laid  out  in 
the  English  style,  and  the  fine  range  of  green- 
houses was  filled  with  the  choicest  and  most 
beautiful  flowers  —  a  luxury  then  only  at- 
tainable by  the  wealthy  and  great.  The 
pavilion  was  a  perfect  museum  of  objects 
of  art.  Joseph  and  his  friend  seem  to  have 
been  greatly  interested  in  them,  and  gener- 
ally well  pleased  with  all  they  saw  —  not 
omitting  the  fair  chatelaine  herself. 

"She  was  then  in  her  thirty-second  year, 
and  still  retained,  without  any  tendency  to 


IN  RETIREMENT  225 

embonpoint,  the  youthful  grace  of  her  tall, 
slight,  elegant  figure.  Powder  dimmed 
not  the  golden  tinge  of  her  wavy  light 
brown  hair,  and  no  rouge  disfigured  her 
face.  A  strange  contrast  this  must  have 
presented  to  eyes  accustomed  to  the 
painted  faces  of  Versailles.  She  now 
dressed  with  great  simplicity,  but  always 
in  excellent  taste.  Leaning  on  the  arm 
of  her  Imperial  guest,  she  conducted  him 
through  those  fine  avenues  of  lofty  forest 
trees  for  which  her  domain  was  famous, 
and  to  those  sites  whence  the  finest  pros- 
pects were  obtained.  And  when,  after 
spending  with  her  the  greater  part  of  the 
day  in  admiring  the  beauties  of  nature  and 
art,  in  both  of  which  Louveciennes  was  so 
rich,  Joseph  took  his  leave,  he  replied  to 
her  thanks  for  the  honor  of  his  visit  to  a 
poor  recluse :  *  Madame,  beauty  is  every- 
where a  queen  ;  and  it  is  I  who  am  honored 
by  your  receiving  my  visit.' 

"  Cynical  as  he  was,  and  sometimes  very 
offensive,  yet  the  Emperor  Joseph,  when 
he  pleased,  could  make  very  gallant 
speeches  and  pay  very  flattering  com- 


15 


THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

pliments.  Nowhere  does  he  seem  to  have 
shown  to  so  much  disadvantage  as  at  Ver- 
sailles, for  all  he  beheld  there  was  out  of 
harmony  with  his  ideas  of  what  ought  to 
have  been.  He  had  a  strong  presentiment 
of  evil  looming  in  the  future  for  France, 
and  that  the  gloomy  horizon  was  fraught 
with  danger  both  to  her  inert  sovereign 
and  his  thoughtless  queen." 

Another  event  which  drew  Madame  Du 
Barry  from  her  retirement  was  the  return 
of  Voltaire  to  France,  and  his  apotheosis  at 
the  Theatre  Francais.  The  ostensible  ob- 
ject of  the  philosopher's  visit  to  Paris  was 
to  rehearse  the  actors  who  were  to  play  his 
new  tragedy,  "  Irene,"  and  for  a  time  it 
seemed  doubtful  whether  this  great  French- 
man would  be  allowed  to  return  to  Paris 
after  his  years  of  exile.  The  clergy  were 
almost  unanimous  in  urging  the  king  to 
forbid  his  return.  But  on  the  other  hand 
all  Paris  was  aroused  at  the  thought  of 
welcoming  once  more  the  great  dramatic 
poet,  philosopher  and  enemy  of  shams,  who 
was  anxious  to  undertake  this  long  and 
arduous  winter  journey  in  order  that  he 


IN   RETIREMENT  229 

might  see  once  more  the  city  that  he  loved 
so  well. 

Worn  out  by  the  fatigue  of  his  long 
journey  and  the  excitement  and  annoyance 
of  constant  rehearsals,  the  venerable  dram- 
atist was  unable  to  take  part  in  the  glories 
of  the  first  representation,  accounts  of  the 
progress  of  which  were  carried  to  his  bed- 
side, from  time  to  time,  during  the  even- 
ing. It  was  for  this  performance,  and 
with  a  view  of  meeting  Voltaire  once 
more,  that  Madame  Du  Barry  came  up  to 
Paris  from  Louveciennes,  and  it  was  at  this 
time  that  she  met  again,  and  for  the  last 
time,  the  Due  de  Richelieu,  and  for  the 
first  time  Benjamin  Franklin,  who  had 
brought  his  grandson  with  him  to  obtain 
the  philosopher's  benediction. 

"  Kneel,  my  son,"  said  the  famous 
American,  "  kneel  before  the  great  man  !  " 

The  youth  obeyed,  and  Voltaire,  laying 
his  hand  on  his  head,  said  in  English, 
"God  and  Liberty!" 

Voltaire  was  able  to  attend  the  sixth 
representation  of  his  play,  but  only  after 
having  been  nerved  for  the  occasion  by 


230       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

strong  stimulants.  He  was  carried  from 
the  theatre  to  his  home  in  an  almost  sense- 
less condition,  and  a  few  days  later  was 
dead. 

The  winter  of  1783  did  much  to  hasten 
the  downfall  of  the  monarchy.  It  was  a 
period  of  unheard-of  severity,  memorable 
above  all  preceding  winters  for  its  seventy- 
six  days  of  intense  cold.  In  the  splendid 
abodes  of  the  rich,  where  there  was  but 
little  provision  for  warmth,  it  was  found 
necessary  to  hang  carpets  and  tapestries 
over  the  huge  doors  and  windows,  and  to 
keep  the  chimney-places  filled,  night  and 
day,  with  blazing  logs,  whose  heat,  how- 
ever, was  more  seen  than  felt,  as  it  disap- 
peared up  the  enormous  chimneys.  But  in 
the  squalid  streets  of  old  Paris,  where  the 
poor  dwelt,  the  poverty  was  more  bitter 
and  the  spirit  of  discontent  fiercer  than 
ever  before.  It  was  a  difficult  matter  for 
the  police  to  keep  the  people  in  check  and 
prevent  them  from  satisfying  their  own 
hunger  from  the  abundance  so  freely  dis- 
played by  the  wasteful  and  selfish  nobility. 
In  the  public  squares,  small  doles  of  black 


IN  RETIREMENT 

bread  were  distributed  to  the  hungry,  many 
of  whom  were  also  employed  for  a  few  sous 
a  day  in  the  work  of  removing  the  snow 
from  the  entrances  to  the  great  palaces  and 
hotels  of  the  nobility  and  modelling  it  into 
huge,  uncouth  statues,  presumably  of  the 
king  and  queen.  The  object  of  this  was 
to  raise  the  cry  of  "  Vive  le  Roi ! "  and  with 
it  "  Vive  la  Reine ! "  But  as  a  general 
thing,  the  cry  of  "  A  bas  1'Autrichienne  " 
made  itself  heard  high  above  the  perfunc- 
tory clamor  of  the  poor  wretches  who  were 
trying  to  hold  their  jobs  by  a  display  of 
patriotism.  So  often,  indeed,  was  this  cry 
heard  and  so  bitter  was  its  tone,  that  when 
Marie  Antoinette  wished  to  enjoy  herself 
again  with  her  sledges,  it  was  deemed  ex- 
pedient to  prevent  it,  for  fear  the  sight  of 
such  luxury  should  prove  an  irritation  to 
the  suffering  people. 

At  this  time,  too,  the  French  soldiers 
returning  from  their  term  of  service  in 
America,  full  of  enthusiasm  for  the  cause 
for  which  they  had  been  fighting  side  by 
side  with  the  Colonists,  urged  upon  their 
countrymen  the  expediency  of  obtaining  for 


232       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

themselves  what  the  Americans,  with  their 
aid,  had  procured  by  their  long  war  of 
revolution.  These  returned  soldiers  were 
justly  proud  of  their  achievements  in  our 
War  of  Independence,  in  whose  benefits 
they  could  have  no  part.  But  they  natu- 
rally expected  that  their  valor  in  serving 
their  king  would  stand  them  in  good  stead 
at  home.  They  found,  however,  that  Gen- 
eral Count  Sagur,  whom  the  queen  had 
made  minister  of  war,  had  issued  orders 
making  it  impossible  for  any  but  noblemen 
to  reach  the  grade  of  officer  in  the  army. 
The  war  being  over,  a  great  many  promo- 
tions were  made,  but  not  in  the  way  of 
rewards  to  men  who  had  rendered  service 
to  their  country. 

The  only  question  asked  of  a  candidate 
was,  "  Have  you  four  quarterings  ?  "  If  he 
had  not,  nothing  could  enable  him  to  rise 
from  the  ranks. 

It  is  worth  remarking  that  in  the  mid- 
dle of  this  very  winter,  young  Napoleon 
Bonaparte,  then  in  his  fifteenth  year  and  a 
student  at  the  military  college  of  Brienne, 
divided  his  schoolmates  into  two  armies, 


IN   RETIREMENT 


233 


A  corner  of  Du  Barry's  bedchamber  in  the  palace  at  Versailles. 

directed  them  in  the  construction  of  a  snow 
fortress,  and  himself  led  the  attacking 
party.  For  ammunition,  they  had  snow- 


234       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

balls  hard  as  ice,  and  in  some  cases,  weighted 
with  stones.  And  history  declares  that  not 
until  the  fortress  was  entirely  demolished 
did  its  defenders  surrender  to  the  future 
Emperor  of  France. 

There  were  many  in  the  court  circle  at 
this  time  who  recalled  with  feelings  of  dire 
apprehension  the  extraordinary  prediction 
once  made  in  the  salon  of  Madame  de 
Coigny  by  that  charming  epigramist  and 
poet,  Cazotte,  who,  at  that  time,  divided 
with  Cagliostro  and  Mesmer  the  honors  of 
clairvoyance.  Cazotte  was  a  man  of 
dreamy  religious  sentiment,  highly  imagi- 
native and  a  mystic.  He  did  not  pretend 
to  make  diamonds  and  gold,  to  heal  the 
sick,  or  give  public  exhibitions  of  science 
combined  with  quackery,  as  his  rivals  did, 
but  occasionally  he  went  into  a  trance,  and 
it  was  then  that  he  was  supposed  to  be 
endowed  with  second  sight. 

It  was  on  one  of  these  occasions  that  he 
simply  heaved  a  deep  sigh  and  gave  no  an- 
swer to  the  question  of  two  or  three  ladies 
of  the  court  circle  who  demanded  eagerly 
the  nature  of  his  vision. 


IN   RETIREMENT  237 

"  Speak,  Cazotte  ! "  cried  the  ladies.  "  Tell 
us  what  you  see ! " 

"  Do  not  ask  me.     It  is  too  sad  ! " 

"  You  must  tell  us  what  it  is,"  per- 
sisted the  ladies,  as  they  gathered  about 
him. 

"  Fearful  things  are  coming  on  France, 
coming  upon  you  all  —  even  upon  you  who 
speak  to  me,"  he  replied  at  last  in  tones  of 
a  half-conscious  person. 

"  But  what  is  it  that  you  see  ?"  they 
demanded. 

"  I  see  a  prison,"  said  Cazotte,  shuddering, 
"  a  cart,  a  large  open  place,  a  strange  kind 
of  machine  resembling  a  scaffold,  and  the 
public  executioner  standing  near  it." 

"And  these  things  —  the  scaffold  and 
the  executioner  are  for  me  ? "  asked  Madame 
de  Montmorency. 

"  For  you,  madame,"  replied  the  seer. 

"  Do  you  see  me  there,  Cazotte  ? "  asked 
Madame  de  Chabot,  laughingly. 

"  I  see  you  there,"  he  said. 

"  You  are  mad  to-night,  Cazotte,"  cried 
Madame  de  Chevreuse,  "  or  you  are  trying 
to  frighten  us." 


238       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

"  Would  to  Heaven,  for  your  sake, 
madame,  that  I  were,"  he  exclaimed. 

"  You  say  you  see  a  cart ;  is  it  not  a 
carriage,  Cazotte  ? "  inquired  Madame  de 
Montmorency. 

"  It  is  a  cart,"  he  answers.  "  To  none, 
after  the  king,  will  the  favor  of  a  carriage 
be  allowed." 

"  To  the  king !  "  exclaimed  several  of  the 
company  who  had  not  hitherto  joined  in 
questioning  the  dreamer.  "  To  the  king  ? " 
demanded  Madame  du  Polignac,  addressing 
herself  directly  to  Cazotte. 

"  To  the  king,"  he  muttered,  despond- 
ingly. 

"  But  the  queen,  —  myself  ?  "  she  asked 
eagerly. 

"  The  queen,  too,  is  there.  Madame  de 
Polignac  stands  in  the  distance  and  a  mist 
envelops  her,"  was  his  reply. 

"  And  yourself,  Cazotte  ? " 

"  As  regards  myself,"  he  answered  sadly, 
"  I  am  as  the  man  who  for  three  days  went 
round  the  City  of  Jerusalem,  crying  aloud, 
'  Woe  !  Woe  ! '  to  the  inhabitants  thereof, 
but  who  on  the  fourth  day  cried  *  Woe  ! 


IN   RETIREMENT 


239 


Woe!'  unto  himself — 'woe  is  me!'  A 
stone  from  a  sling  was  aimed  at  him,  struck 
him  on  his  temple  and  he  died." 

Cazotte  was  guillotined  in  1792.  The 
rest  of  his  predestined  victims  perished  at 
about  the  same  time,  though  Madame  de 
Polignac  lived  until  the  following  year  and 
died  in  December,  at  Vienna,  a  place  of 
safe  distance,  that  was  perhaps  signified 
by  the  mist  in  which  Cazotte  saw  her 
enveloped. 


CHAPTER   XI 

THE    STORM    BREAKS 

OR  more  than  fifteen 
years  Jeanette  Du 
Barry  had  lived  quietly 
on  her  beautiful  estate 
Louveciennes,  keeping 
up  a  few  of  her  old 
court  intimacies,  re- 
ceiving visits  now  and  then  from  foreign 
princes  and  other  distinguished  travellers, 
and  enjoying  a  calm,  happy  life  in  which 
there  was  neither  intrigue  nor  agitation  nor 
danger  of  dismissal  and  disgrace.  Her 
affairs  were  prosperous,  her  debts  settled, 
and  she  was  able  to  live  handsomely  and 
have  money  to  spare  for  her  friends  and 
for  charity.  She  was  greatly  beloved  by 
the  poor  and  sick  of  the  neighborhood 
whom  she  visited  and  aided,  and  there  was 


THE   STORM   BREAKS  241 

no  one  in  the  town  who  had  not  a  kind 
word  for  the  ex-Favorite  of  Louis  XV. 

Undoubtedly  these  years  of  exile  were 
the  happiest  in  her  whole  life,  and  well 
they  might  have  been,  for  through  them 
all  she  was  sustained  and  cheered  by  the 
devoted  love  of  Cosse-Brissac. 

As  years  rolled  on  travellers  ceased  to 
visit  her,  her  name  dropped  out  of  the 
public  prints,  and  finally  she  came  to  be 
forgotten  of  all  the  world  save  the  little 
one  of  her  immediate  vicinage.  Her  sym- 
pathies were  still  with  the  royal  family,  and 
she  was  outspoken  in  her  denunciations  of 
the  revolutionary  party,  which  was  gaining 
in  strength  every  hour,  for  the  indignities 
which  it  sought  to  heap  upon  the  heads  of 
Louis  XVI  and  Marie  Antoinette. 

The  deluge  long  since  predicted  by  the 
Marquise  de  Pompadour  was  underway  at 
last,  and  the  axe  that  may  have  disturbed 
the  visions  of  Louis  XV,  that  certainly 
gleamed  through  the  prophetic  warning  of 
Damiens  —  "  the  shabby  man  with  the 
penknife"  who  was  so  far  ahead  of  his 
time  —  the  axe  that  the  actress  sees  in 

16 


242       THE   STORY  OF   DU   BARRY 

the  very  first  act  of  the  drama  has  become 
a  stern  reality  now.  The  days  are  begin- 
ning to  be  busy  ones  for  the  executioner, 
and  those  who  value  their  heads  are  hasten- 
ing to  declare  their  friendship  for  the 
nation  and  their  hatred  of  royalty  and 
aristocracy. 

So  completely  forgotten  was  the  woman 
who  had  played  such  a  conspicuous  part  at 
the  court  of  the  king  that  up  to  the  begin- 
ning of  the  year  1791  no  attention  was 
paid  to  her  by  the  aggressive  patriots  of 
the  revolutionary  party  nor  had  her  name 
been  dragged  into  the  papers  or  political 
discussions  for  many  years,  save  once  when 
some  demagogue  declared  that  the  National 
Assembly  cost  but  a  quarter  of  the  sum 
that  Louis  XV  squandered  on  the  woman 
whom  he  himself  had  seen  covered  with 
diamonds  and  giving  away  basketfuls  of 
louis  d'or  to  her  relatives. 

In  all  probability  the  black  storm  which 
was  now  gathering  over  France  might  have 
broken  and  spent  its  terrific  force  without 
making  itself  felt  in  the  little  chateau 
where  this  still  beautiful  survivor  of  the 


THE   STORM   BREAKS  245 

court  of  Louis  XV  was  living  out  her 
days  peacefully  and  secure  in  the  good 
will  of  all  around  her,  had  it  not  been  for 
a  comparatively  unimportant  happening 
which  served  to  alter  the  whole  course  of 
her  life. 

On  the  night  of  January  10,  1791,  dur- 
ing the  absence  of  Madame  Du  Barry, 
who  was  visiting  the  family  of  Brissac  in 
Paris,  the  chateau  was  opened  by  robbers 
and  a  vast  number  of  diamonds  and  other 
precious  stones  were  stolen.  In  her  en- 
deavors to  recover  her  property,  she  took 
into  her  confidence  the  jeweller  Rouen,  and 
he,  in  an  ill-considered  moment,  caused 
the  dead  walls  of  Paris  to  be  placarded 
with  a  long  list  of  the  precious  stones,  de- 
scribed in  detail  under  the  words  "  Two 
Thousand  Louis  To  Gain." 

This  happened  at  a  moment  when 
hunger,  cold  and  misery,  combined  with 
the  insidious  oratory  of  demagogues  and 
the  inspiring  words  of  patriots,  were  lead- 
ing the  people  at  a  rapid  pace  toward  an- 
archy —  Nature's  primitive  remedy  for  all 
social  ills.  These  placards  were  displayed 


246       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

before  the  eyes  of  men  and  women  who 
were  suffering  for  want  of  the  bare  neces- 
sities of  life.  Being  without  occupation 
they  could  find  time  to  read  and  talk  over 
among  themselves  the  great  list  of  dia- 
monds, sapphires,  emeralds,  rubies  arid 
pearls.  And  as  they  read,  and  wondered 
how  one  human  being  could  be  so  fortu- 
nate as  to  possess  all  this  wealth  while  they 
went  naked  and  hungry,  they  remembered 
who  and  what  this  almost  forgotten  woman 
had  been.  They  had  heard,  perhaps,  in  an 
exaggerated  form,  of  the  way  in  which 
kings  were  wont  to  cover  the  bodies  of 
their  favorite  women  with  diamonds  while 
the  peasantry  perished  of  hunger  and  cold. 
They  had  heard  vaguely  of  luxury  in  high 
places,  of  the  wastefulness  in  Versailles, 
while  the  poor  were  clamoring  for  bread 
at  the  very  palace  gates.  They  had  heard 
all  these  things  from  the  lips  of  their  ora- 
tors, half  believing  perhaps  and  wholly  un- 
comprehending the  significance  of  it  all. 

Now,  all  at  once,  there  was  flashed  into 
the  wan  faces  of  these  desperate  ones  a  list 
of  the  very  jewels  that  had  gone  to  deck 


THE   STORM   BREAKS 


247 


the  body  of  their  king's  courtesan  at  the 
time  when  they  themselves  perhaps  had 
seen  their  loved  ones  sicken  before  their 
eyes  and  perish  for  lack  of  food.  The  mere 
fact  that  a  man  of  affairs 
like  Rouen  should  placard  jl 
the  streets  with  such  an  -4-* 
incendiary  docu- 
ment as  th 
without  ever 
thinking  of 
what  it  might 
provoke,  indi- 
cates how 
little  even 
the  intelligent 
part  of  the 
French  peo- 
ple knew  of 
the  dangers 

that  threatened.     This,  too,  at  a  time  when 
the  Revolution  had  actually  begun. 

About  the  middle  of  February  of  the 
same  year  five  men  entered  the  shop  of  M. 
Simon,  the  rich  London  lapidary,  and 
offered  to  sell  him  a  quantity  of  precious 


Spinnet  of  the  period. 


248       THE   STORY    OF   DU   BARRY 

stones  for  which  they  asked  only  about 
one-sixth  of  their  actual  value.  The  lapi- 
dary purchased  them  for  fifteen  hundred 
pounds,  and  on  learning  from  the  men  that 
they  had  others  of  still  greater  value  to 
dispose  of,  promised  to  take  them  also,  and 
then  quietly  notified  the  authorities.  The 
men  were  arrested  that  night,  and  although 
they  contrived  to  destroy  one  or  two  of  the 
larger  gems  by  throwing  them  into  the  fire, 
the  bulk  of  their  booty  was  recovered  and 
word  sent  to  the  Countess  Du  Barry. 

Overjoyed  at  the  news,  she  left  at  once 
for  London,  saw  the  jewels  and  identified 
them,  declaring  under  oath  that  they  be- 
longed to  her.  Unfortunately  other  legal 
proceedings  were  necessary  before  the  gems 
could  be  turned  over  to  her  and  she  was 
obliged  to  return  to  France,  after  leaving 
them  deposited  with  her  bankers,  sealed 
with  her  own  and  their  seal. 

On  the  4th  of  April  she  started  again, 
taking  with  her  this  time  the  jeweller, 
Rouen,  and  remaining  until  the  21st  of 
May,  when  she  returned  again  without 
her  property.  A  third  journey  followed 


THE   STORM   BREAKS  249 

from  which  she  returned  late  in  August, 
feeling  much  cast  down  and  disappointed 
over  the  tediousness  of  English  law  pro- 
cesses. After  Madame  Du  Barry's  return 
to  France  the  National  High  Court  entered 
upon  its  functions  at  Orleans  and  the  new 
method  of  beheading  prisoners  by  the 
guillotine  was  adopted.  It  is  said  that  a 
model  of  this  machine  fell  under  the  eyes 
of  Louis  XVI  at  the  time  that  it  was  under 
legislative  consideration,  and  he,  being  an 
expert  amateur  machinist,  suggested  an 
improvement  which  was  actually  utilized 
by  the  inventor  and  is  still  in  use  in  the 
machine  that  is  used  in  France  at  the 
present  day. 

Things  were  marching  briskly  now  and 
the  work  of  the  executioner  was  growing 
heavier  every  day.  Lafayette,  who,  since 
his  return  from  America,  had  been  a  domi- 
nant figure  in  the  changing  fortunes  of  his 
country,  was  compelled  to  leave  France 
and  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Austrians, 
who  kept  him  in  prison  until  years  after- 
wards when  Napoleon  Bonaparte  demanded 
his  release.  The  king  and  royal  family 


250       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

were  made  prisoners  and,  what  was  of  far 
greater  concern  to  Madame  Du  Barry,  her 
devoted  lover,  Cosse-Brissac,  who  had 
been  removed  from  his  command  of  the 
king's  military  establishment,  was  beheaded, 
together  with  hundreds  of  other  prisoners 
in  the  September  massacres.  His  head 
was  carried  to  L,ouveciennes  and  thrown 
through  the  window  of  the  room  in  which 
Madame  Du  Barry  was  seated. 

In  October  of  the  year  following,  Mad- 
ame Du  Barry  started  once  more  for  Lon- 
don from  which  she  returned  in  March, 
1793.  During  this,  as  well  as  other  visits 
to  England,  she  received  attentions  from 
the  hands  of  many  of  the  most  noted  men  in 
the  kingdom,  and  as  it  afterwards  transpired, 
her  movements  were  carefully  watched  and 
noted  by  spies  in  the  employ  of  her  ene- 
mies at  home.  During  her  last  visit  the 
Revolution  had  gained  terrific  headway, 
the  king  and  queen  had  perished  on  the 
scaffold,  and  William  Pitt,  whom  she  saw 
a  number  of  times  and  who  gave  her  a 
medal  that  had  been  struck  in  his  honor, 
urged  her  to  remain  in  England,  knowing 


With  Breaking  Heart. 


THE   STORM   BREAKS  253 

perfectly  well  the  risk  that  she  ran  in 
returning  to  a  country  that  was  inflamed 
against  the  old  monarchy  and  everything 
connected  with  it. 

Madame  Du  Barry,  however,  had  full  con- 
fidence in  the  protection  that  would  be  af- 
forded her  in  Louveciennes,  which  she  had 
left  but  a  short  time  before  a  peaceful  com- 
munity, undisturbed  by  the  storms  that 
were  shaking  the  country  to  its  founda- 
tions, and  inhabited  by  people  who  were 
one  and  all  grateful  to  her  for  what  she 
had  done  for  them. 

During  her  absence,  however,  a  man 
named  George  Greive,  who  claimed  citizen- 
ship in  the  United  States  of  America,  and 
described  himself  as  "  factionist  and  anar- 
chist of  the  first  rank  and  disorganizer  of 
despotism  in  both  hemispheres,"  had  settled 
in  the  village  and  impregnated  its  inhabi- 
tants with  the  doctrines  which  he  preached. 
This  demagogue  was  a  friend  of  Marat  and 
was  actually  to  have  dined  with  him  on  the 
day  that  Charlotte  Corday  rid  the  world  of 
his  presence.  Marat  always  hated  Du  Barry, 
and  it  is  more  than  likely  that  he  suggested 


254.      THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

her  to  Greive  as  one  whom  it  would  be  easy 
to  destroy  and  whose  wealth  was  sufficient 
to  yield  something  to  the  instrument  of  her 
destruction. 

Through  the  exertions  of  this  patriot, 
who  at  Marat's  suggestion  had  lost  no  time 
in  domiciling  himself  in  Louveciennes,  the 
villagers  were  persuaded  that  Madame  Du 
Barry  had  really  turned  emigree,  and  had 
settled  in  England  without  any  intention 
of  returning  to  her  own  country.  Imbued 
with  this  belief,  seals  were  set  on  the  doors 
of  her  chateau  as  a  preliminary  step  to  con- 
fiscation. But  the  sudden  appearance  of 
the  owner  put  a  stop  to  this  work,  and  the 
mayor  of  the  town  was  easily  induced  to 
remove  the  seals.  Undismayed  by  the  fail- 
ure of  this  plot,  and  knowing  Du  Barry's 
popularity  among  the  villagers,  Greive' s 
next  attempt  took  the  form  of  an  address 
to  the  authorities  of  the  Department  of  the 
Seine  et  Oise,  in  which,  backed  by  the  sig- 
natures of  thirty-six  citizens  of  the  village, 
he  complained  of  the  presence  there  of  many 
aristocrats  and  suspected  persons.  On  the 
strength  of  this  address,  Madame  Du  Barry 


THE   STORM   BREAKS  255 

was  placed  under  arrest  in  her  own  house, 
and,  after  official  inquiry,  was  set  at  liberty 
again,  the  authorities  of  the  Seine  et  Oise 
showing  no  disposition  to  deal  harshly  with 
her.  One  of  its  members,  indeed,  Lavallery 
by  name,  is  said  to  have  shown  a  decided 
partiality  for  this  still  handsome  and  attrac- 
tive woman  of  fifty. 

Had  Madame  Du  Barry  procured  her 
passports  and  repaired  to  England  the  mo- 
ment she  was  released,  she  would  undoubt- 
edly have  enjoyed  a  much  longer  life  than 
she  did.  Unfortunately  for  herself,  she 
chose  to  remain  in  her  chateau,  trusting 
to  the  integrity  of  her  respectable  neigh- 
bors, and  fearing  that  if  she  did  leave  the 
country,  her  house,  with  all  its  exquisite 
furniture  and  works  of  art,  would  be  confis- 
cated by  the  republicans.  It  may  have 
been  that  another  lover  engrossed  her  at- 
tention at  that  time  —  it  seems  that  she 
was  never  at  a  loss  for  a  sweetheart  —  but 
certain  it  is  that  she  chose  to  remain  and 
she  paid  dearly  for  the  mistake. 

Early  in  September,  1793,  Greive  began 
again  his  denunciations  of  her,  and  on  the 


256       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

22d  of  that  month  she  was  arrested  and 
lodged  in  the  prison  of  Sainte  Pelagic, 
while  seals  were  placed  upon  the  doors  of 
her  chateau.  Madame  Roland  was  incar- 
cerated there  at  this  time,  and  it  has  been 
said  that  the  widow  of  the  recently  guil- 
lotined General  Beauharnais,  afterwards 
Empress  of  France,  was  arrested  on  the 
same  day. 

There  is  a  story  told  of  the  ex-Favorite 
during  her  imprisonment  which,  although 
characteristic  of  her  in  many  ways,  can 
hardly  be  reconciled  with  her  conduct  a 
short  time  later,  when  brought  face  to  face 
with  death  on  the  scaffold.  An  Irish  priest, 
who  had  contrived  to  obtain  access  to  her 
in  her  cell,  offered  to  save  her  if  she  could 
supply  him  with  a  certain  sum  of  money 
with  which  to  bribe  the  jailers.  She  asked 
him  if  it  would  be  possible  to  save  two 
women,  and  on  learning  that  it  would  not, 
she  gave  him  an  order  on  her  bankers  for 
the  necessary  sum,  and  bade  him  save  the 
Duchesse  de  Mortemart,  who  was  at  that 
time  lying  concealed  in  a  loft  in  Calais. 
The  priest,  having  urged  her  in  vain  to 


THE   STORM   BREAKS 


257 


permit  him  to  save  her  instead  of  her  friend, 
took  the  order,  and  with  the  money  which 
he  obtained  on  it,  went  to  Calais  and 
rescued  the  duchess  from  her  attic  retreat. 
Then  taking  her  by  the  arm,  he  set  out  on 
foot,  explaining  to  all  who  noticed  his  cleri- 
cal garb,  that  he  was  a  good  constitutional 
priest  and  as  such  had  married  the  woman. 
In  this  way  he  managed  to  pass  through 
the  French  lines  to  Ostend,  where  he  em- 
barked for  England,  taking  with  him  the 
duchess,  who,  in  after  years,  related  the 
whole  story  to  Dutens,  the  author  of  "  Me- 
moirs of  a  Traveller  taking  a  Rest,"  in  which 
entertaining  volume  it  is  chronicled. 


17 


CHAPTER  XII 

DREYFUS-LIKE    JUSTICE 

HE  methods  employed 
in  the  trial  of  Madame 
Du  Barry  would  seem 
incomprehensible  to 
American  readers,  were 
it  not  for  the  fact  that 
the  Dreyfus  trial,  con- 
ducted on  similar  lines  a  very  few  years 
ago,  served  to  familiarize  us  with  the  man- 
ner in  which  French  tribunals  administer 
the  Gallic  equivalent  of  justice.  We  all 
remember  the  important  testimony  offered 
by  the  different  French  officers,  who  knew 
that  Dreyfus  was  guilty,  "  because  it  could 
not  be  otherwise,"  and  the  weighty  evidence 
of  those  who  made  a  profound  impression  on 
the  court  by  declaring  that  the  prisoner  was 
certainly  guilty,  "  because  if  he  was  not, 
who  was  ? "  We  can  also  recall  the  pub- 


^ 

s 


DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE  261 

lished  accounts  of  the  execrations  hurled  by 
the  populace  at  those  who  endeavored  to 
stem  the  fierce  tide  of  racial  hatred  evoked 
by  the  trial,  and  of  the  applause  which 
greeted  that  "  hero  of  the  hour,"  who  was 
shown  to  have  taken  away  the  captive's 
writing  paper  and  ink. 

For  the  name  Dreyfus,  substitute  that  of 
Jeanette  Du  Barry,  go  back  a  little  more 
than  a  century  in  time,  and  not  a  single 
degree  in  civilization  or  mercy,  and  we 
have  the  trial  of  the  last  of  the  race  of 
queens  of  the  left  hand  that  France  has 
ever  known. 

She  was  accused  of  conspiring  against 
the  French  Republic  and  favoring  the  suc- 
cess of  English  arms  ;  of  wearing  mourning 
for  the  late  king ;  of  having  in  her  posses- 
sion a  medal  of  Pitt,  the  English  states- 
man ;  of  having  buried  at  Louveciennes  the 
letters  of  nobility  of  an  emigre,  and  also  the 
busts  of  persons  prominent  at  the  court  of 
her  royal  lover ;  and  of  having  wasted  the 
public  money  by  her  extravagance. 

The  first  witness  against  her  was  Greive, 
who  testified  that  he  had  found  near  her 


262       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

house  a  quantity  of  precious  stones,  together 
with  portraits  of  Louis  XV,  Anne  of  Aus- 
tria, and  the  Regent,  and  a  medal  bearing 
the  likeness  of  Pitt.  He  also  testified  that 
an  English  spy  named  Forth  made  fre- 
quent journeys  between  Louveciennes  and 
London,  ostensibly  on  business  connected 
with  the  diamond  robbery,  and  that  the 
general  opinion  of  the  villagers  was  that 
the  robbery  was  nothing  but  a  pretence. 

A  man  named  Blache  swore  that  Madame 
Du  Barry  wore  mourning  for  Louis  XVI 
when  she  was  in  London,  and  one  of  her 
discharged  servants,  Salanave,  declared  that 
his  dismissal  from  the  household  was  due 
to  the  fact  that  he  was  a  patriot,  whereas  all 
the  other  servants  sympathized  with  the 
aristocracy. 

Then  Zamore,  the  black  dwarf,  who  owed 
everything  that  he  possessed  to  the  favor  of 
his  mistress,  swore  that  most  of  her  guests 
were  not  patriots,  and  that  he  himself  had 
heard  them  rejoice  over  the  defeats  of  the 
armies  of  the  Republic.  He  declared  that 
he  had  frequently  rebuked  Madame  Du 
Barry  for  associating  with  aristocrats  and 


DREYFUS   LIRE-JUSTICE  263 

that  he  was  positive  that  there  had  been 
no  actual  robbery  of  jewels. 

These  were  the  most  important  wit- 
nesses for  the  prosecution.  There  were 
also  a  surgeon  named  Augustin  Devrey, 
who  testified  that  he  had  "  once  heard  the 
Widow  Collet  say  that  some  time  after 
the  arrest  of  Brissac,  Du  Barry  spent 
the  night  in  destroying  papers  ; "  and  one 
Claude  Reda,  a  fencing  master,  who 
gravely  declared  that  he  "had  heard  it 
said  that  when  Du  Barry  was  in  London 
she  saw  the  Colonnes." 

Certainly  there  is  a  Dreyfus-like  ring,  as 
well  as  a  suggestion  of  the  mental  capac- 
ity of  the  jury,  in  these  passages  taken  from 
the  speech  of  Fouquier-Tinville  for  the 
prosecution :  "  You  have  judged  the  con- 
spiracy of  the  wife  of  the  last  tyrant  of  the 
French,  and  you  have  at  this  moment  to 
judge  the  plots  of  the  courtesan  of  his  in- 
famous predecessor.  You  have  to  decide 
if  this  Messalina  —  born  amongst  the  peo- 
ple, enriched  by  the  spoils  of  the  people 
and  who,  by  the  death  of  the  tyrant,  fell 
from  the  rank  in  which  crime  alone  had 


264       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

placed  her  —  has  conspired  against  the 
liberty  and  sovereignty  of  the  people ;  if, 
after  being  the  accomplice  and  the  instru- 
ment of  the  libertinage  of  kings,  she  has 
become  the  agent  of  the  conspiracies  of 
tyrants,  nobles,  and  priests  against  the 
French  Republic.  You  know  what  light 
the  evidence  of  the  witnesses  and  the 
documents  have  thrown  upon  this  plot ! 
It  is  for  you,  in  your  wisdom,  to  weigh 
the  evidence.  You  see  that  royalists, 
federalists,  all  these  factions,  though  di- 
vided amongst  themselves  in  appearance, 
have  the  same  centre,  the  same  object,  the 
same  end. 

"  The  war,  abroad  or  in  La  Vendee,  the 
troubles  in  the  South,  the  insurrections  in 
Calvaldos  —  all  march  under  the  orders  of 
Pitt,  but  now  the  veil  which  covered  so 
much  wickedness  has  been  rent  in  twain 
and  nothing  remains  of  the  conspirators 
but  shame  and  the  punishment  of  their 
infamous  plots.  Yes,  Frenchmen,  we 
swear  that  the  traitors  shall  perish  and 
liberty  alone  shall  endure !  In  striking 
with  the  sword  of  the  law  a  conspiratrice, 


DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE  265 


A  corner  of  the,  property  room. 


a  Messalina  guilty  of  plotting  against  the 
country,  you  not  only  avenge  the  Re- 
public, but  you  uproot  a  public  scandal, 
and  you  strengthen  the  rule  of  that  mo- 


266       THE   STORY   OF  DU  BARRY 

rality  which  is  the  chief  base  of  the  liberty 
of  the  people." 

With  Madame  Du  Barry  were  tried  also 
the  three  Vandenyvers,  members  of  the 
firm  of  Dutch  bankers  with  whom  she 
kept  her  account.  The  chief  charge 
against  these  men  was  that  they  had  fur- 
nished the  accused  woman  with  money  in 
the  shape  of  letters  of  credit  to  be  used  by 
her  during  her  visit  to  London.  Accord- 
ing to  their  own  admission,  they  furnished 
letters  of  credit  to  Madame  Du  Barry 
"  because  she  had  established  the  fact  and 
satisfied  them  as  to  her  having  passports, 
and,  not  being  judges  of  their  validity, 
thought  there  was  nothing  in  supplying 
her  with  the  sums  she  demanded." 

There  was  not  a  particle  of  evidence  of 
any  sort  of  crime  on  the  part  of  these  finan- 
ciers. The  principal  figure  in  the  trial  was 
known  to  be  a  woman  of  loose  morals, 
upon  whom  had  been  squandered  millions 
of  the  public  money,  and  it  was  not  un- 
natural that  the  vengeance  of  a  long  suf- 
fering and  now  bloodthirsty  people  should 
fall  upon  her  head.  For  the  murder  of 


DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE          269 

the  Vandenyvers,  however,  there  was  not 
one  shadow  of  an  excuse. 

No  witnesses  were  called  for  the  defence. 
Nor  is  this  fact  likely  to  prove  a  surprise 
to  any  one  familiar  with  the  proceedings 
in  the  Dreyfus  case,  or  with  certain  still 
more  recent  happenings  in  New  York. 
We  all  know  how  it  fared  with  Zola  be- 
cause of  his  championship  of  the  weak 
against  the  strong,  and  such  of  us  as  live 
in  New  York,  believe  that  if  there  is  one 
thing  more  unlucky  than  walking  under  a 
ladder,  it  is  giving  testimony  in  the  courts 
against  a  police  detective. 

That  the  jury  had  some  qualms  of  con- 
science about  this  blood-letting  is  indicated 
by  the  fact  that  it  deliberated  for  an  hour 
and  a  quarter,  which  is  one  quarter  of  an 
hour  more  than  was  given  to  the  considera- 
tion of  the  case  of  Marie  Antoinette.  At 
the  end  of  that  time  it  returned  a  verdict  of 
guilty  on  every  count  in  the  indictment, 
and,  Fouquier-Tinville  having  demanded 
the  "  application  of  the  law,"  all  four  pris- 
oners were  sentenced  to  suffer  death  within 
the  space  of  twelve  hours. 


270       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

But  Madame  Du  Barry,  hoping  to  gain 
time  and  perhaps  mercy,  sent  for  Denisot, 
one  of  her  judges,  Claude  Rougere,  the 
Deputy  Public  Accuser,  and  Tavernier,  a 
greffier,  and  to  them  made  a  confession  or 
declaration  in  regard  to  her  concealed  prop- 
erty. To  these  men  she  gave  a  list  of 
about  two  hundred  and  fifty  articles  of  jew- 
elry and  gold  and  silver  plate  which,  to- 
gether with  several  sacks  of  money,  she 
had  buried  in  different  parts  of  her  garden. 
In  her  terror,  and  perhaps  without  a  thought 
of  what  she  was  doing,  she  did  not  hesitate 
to  implicate  in  her  confession  those  who 
had  helped  her  in  her  work  of  concealment, 
some  of  whom  paid  with  their  lives  the 
penalty  of  their  devotion  to  her.  She  firmly 
believed  that  if  she  gave  up  everything  her 
life  would  be  spared.  But  no  sooner  was 
the  confession  ended  than  orders  were 
given  for  her  execution  on  the  following 
day. 

In  the  memoirs  of  the  de  Goncours  we 
find  this  striking  picture  of  the  last  of  the 
favorites  during  the  few  hours  that  imme- 
diately preceded  her  death  : 


DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE  271 

"  At  the  reading  of  this  sentence,  pros- 
trated, overwhelmed  by  stupor  and  horror, 
Madame  Du  Barry  suddenly  lost  the  cool- 
ness and  the  remnant  of  dignity  which  she 
had  exhibited  during  the  trial.  When  she 
saw  that  all  was  over,  that  she  was  about 
to  be  led  away  and  that  the  witnesses  who 
had  been  present  during  the  scene  rubbed 
their  hands  and  enjoyed  her  agony  shame- 
lessly, she  was  stricken  with  such  a  physi- 
cal weakness  that  the  gendarmes  were 
obliged  to  support  her  with  their  arms, 
while  the  fear  that  she  would  die  before 
reaching  the  scaffold  took  possession  of  the 
anxious  multitude. 

"  The  trouble,  the  fright,  the  utter  help- 
lessness, the  prostration  of  the  woman  in 
the  presence  of  death  —  and  of  such  a  death 
-  was  so  great  that  she,  who  all  her  life 
had  thought  only  of  living,  in  one  moment 
forgot  everything,  affection,  gratitude,  debts 
of  love,  sacred  engagements,  the  secrets 
and  the  devotion  of  those  who  had  compro- 
mised themselves  for  her.  Hoping  to  save 
her  life  by  selling  the  lives  of  others, 
believing  that  she  could  buy  pardon,  or  at 


272       THE   STORY   OF  DU   BARRY 

least  a  reprieve  by  giving  up  what  remained 
of  hidden  treasure,  we  find  her  on  the  day 
of  her  execution  at  ten  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing, quite  pale  after  a  night  of  terror, 
trembling  and  supplicating  between  the 
two  wickets  of  the  Conciergerie,  flinging 
toward  the  advancing  executioner,  toward 
the  hour  of  doom  so  nigh,  toward  the  guil- 
lotine looming  about  her,  the  precipitate 
and  breathless  confession  of  everything  that 
she  had  buried,  concealed  and  kept  back 
from  the  scent  of  the  Republic  and  from 
the  cupidities  of  the  year  II  !  To  Justice 
Denisot,  to  Claude  Rougere,  substitute  of 
the  public  prosecutor,  Madame  Du  Barry 
gives  detail  as  to  the  precious  objects  buried 
in  the  garden  of  Louveciennes,  buried  in 
the  thickets,  concealed  in  the  corridors  and 
in  the  cellar,  in  the  garden  of  her  valet, 
that  faithful  Morin  who  will  afterwards  pay 
with  his  head  for  his  mistress's  disclosure, 
concealed  in  the  house  of  the  woman 
Deliant,  concealed  on  the  premises  of  Citi- 
zen Montrouy. 

"  Under  the  stroke  of  terror,  she  remem- 
bers and  finds  everything  again,  bit  by  bit, 


DREYFUS-LIKE   JUSTICE  273 

louis  by  louis,  down  to  a  plate,  down  to  a 
spoon,  for  it  is  her  life  that  she  is  going  to 
recover.  In  her  zeal,  in  her  anguish,  fearing 
that  all  this  treasure  will  not  suffice  still  to 
pay  for  her  pardon,  she  undertakes  to  write 
to  London,  if  it  is  the  good  pleasure  of  the 
Tribunal,  to  get  back  all  the  articles  in  the 
theft  of  1791  deposited  with  Morland,  with 
Moncelet  and  with  Ramson.  Unhappy 
being !  She  forgot  that  the  Revolution 
would  be  her  heir." 

Jeanette  Du  Barry  met  death  in  a  way 
that  even  moved  the  blood-thirsty  onlook- 
ers to  something  like  pity.  It  was  a  time 
when  the  knife  was  for  women  as  well  as 
men  and  when  courage  at  the  supreme  mo- 
ment of  death  was  not  a  matter  of  sex. 
Marie  Antoinette,  Madame  Roland,  Char- 
lotte Corday  and  scores  of  others  mounted 
the  scaffold  with  faces  that  were  calm  and 
often  smiling,  and  died  without  giving  sign 
of  fear.  These  women  died  for  some  prin- 
ciple in  which  they  believed.  Poor  Du 
Barry,  however,  died  only  because  of  her 
beauty,  which  had  turned  the  head  of  a  king. 
And  with  that  beauty  faded,  her  royal  lover 

18 


274       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

dead  and  gone,  as  well  as  the  old  order  of 
things  for  which  he  stood,  she  had  nothing 
to  sustain  her  in  her  final  hour. 

Crouching  in  the  cart,  and  with  a  face 
as  white  as  the  robe  she  wore,  she  passed 
through  the  great  crowd  that  had  assembled 
to  look  upon  the  mistress  of  its  former  king. 
AVith  her  were  the  Vandenyvers  and  they 
sought  to  sustain  her  with  words  of  cheer 
and  encouragement.  Her  only  replies,  how- 
ever, were  sobs  and  moans  and  inarticulate 
cries  for  mercy.  Greive,  the  anarchist,  was 
there  among  the  rest,  laughing  heartily,  as 
he  afterwards  said,  at  the  grimaces  of  the 
unfortunate  woman  whom  he  had  hounded 
to  the  scaffold.  The  cart  entered  the  rue 
St.  Honore  and  passed  directly  in  front 
of  Labille's  shop,  where,  a  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury before,  she  had  learned  her  trade  of 
bonnet-making.  A  score  of  girls,  employed 
there  now  just  as  she  had  been  in  her  young 
days,  had  stationed  themselves  on  the  bal- 
cony to  obtain  a  glimpse  of  this  world-famous 
beauty  who  had  once  been  an  apprentice 
herself  in  that  very  shop,  had  lived  to  rule 
her  king  and  to  make  and  unmake  cabinets, 


"  Swear  on  the  Cross  !  " 


R 
5 

1 

,<a 

sj 


DREYFUS-LIKE   JUSTICE  277 

and  was  now  to  crown  her  whole  marvel- 
lous career  with  a  single  moment  of  anguish 
on  the  block. 

At  the  sight  of  these  girls  looking  down 
upon  her  with  pitying  eyes,  the  condemned 
woman  seemed  to  awake  to  a  sudden  and 
hideous  realization  of  what  was  before  her, 
and  shriek  after  shriek  rang  through  the 
crowded  street.  The  executioner  and  his 
assistants  used  all  their  force  in  their  efforts 
to  prevent  her  from  throwing  herself  to  the 
ground.  Foiled  in  this  desire,  she  leant  over 
the  edge  of  the  cart  and  frantically  begged 
for  her  life. 

"  My  friends,  save  me !  I  have  never 
done  harm  to  any  one  in  my  life !  In 
Heaven's  name,  save  me ! " 

It  was  almost  the  first  time  that  the 
spectacle  of  a  woman  dying  in  abject  terror, 
and  without  even  a  show  of  bravado,  had 
been  seen  in  Paris,  and  something  like  a 
murmur  of  pity  began  to  make  itself  heard. 

"  Life  !  Life  !  Give  me  my  life,  good 
people,  and  all  my  goods  shall  be  yours ! " 
she  implored. 

"  Your  goods  !     Bah  !     They  all  belong 


278        THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

to  the  nation  already ! "  cried  a  man  con- 
temptuously, and  a  coalheaver  standing  in 
front  of  him  turned  and  levelled  him  to  the 
earth  with  a  single  blow  in  the  face. 

The  people  approved  the  act.  The  pity- 
ing murmurs  grew  louder,  and  if  the  driver 
had  not  urged  his  horse  to  a  gallop,  there 
might  have  been  a  rescue. 

Arrived  at  the  gallows,  it  was  necessary 
for  the  executioners  to  lift  her  bodily  from 
the  cart  and  up  the  steps.  Even  when  tied 
to  the  plank  she  struggled  frantically  and 
begged  piteously  for  just  one  second  more 
of  life.  The  descending  knife  silenced  her 
cries,  and  the  executioner  held  up  before  the 
eyes  of  the  crowd  the  bleeding  head  of  the 
woman  who  had  done  little,  indeed,  to  de- 
serve such  a  death. 

The  last  act  of  the  play  compresses  into 
three  short  scenes  the  tragic,  pitiable  story 
of  Du  Barry's  persecution  and  death.  In 
the  first  of  these  scenes  we  see  her  living 
on  her  estate  in  Louveciennes,  attended  by 
her  faithful  servant  Denys  and  one  or  two 
friends  of  her  former  years.  Here,  at  the 
instigation  of  Greive,  she  is  arrested, 


DREYFUS-LIKE  JUSTICE          279 

although  nineteen  years  have  passed  since 
death  put  an  end  to  her  relation  witli  the 
king.  These  years  have  been  full  of 
changes,  not  only  for  her,  but  for  all  France 
as  well,  and  in  no  respect  are  these  changes 
shown  more  plainly  than  in  the  dresses  of 
the  revolutionary  patriots.  In  the  pre- 
ceding acts  of  the  drama,  we  have  only 
seen  the  laces,  ruffles,  small  clothes  and 
elaborate  coiffures  of  a  luxurious  and  disso- 
lute age.  Now  we  see  the  ugly  beginnings 
of  the  sort  of  dress  to  which  we,  of  the 
present  generation,  have  been  condemned. 
Escorted  by  soldiers  of  the  Republic,  and 
with  the  angry  murmurs  of  the  mob  ringing 
in  her  ears,  she  is  taken  away  to  Paris,  and 
the  scene  changes  to  her  prison  cell  in  the 
Conciergerie.  Here  she  is  visited  by 
Denisot,  the  judge  of  the  revolutionary 
court,  and  two  associates,  who,  while  buoy- 
ing her  up  with  vague  hopes  of  a  pardon, 
take  from  her  a  finger  ring,  the  very  last 
bit  of  property  in  her  possession.  This 
done,  they  withdraw,  the  sound  of  work- 
men, busy  at  the  scaffold,  is  heard,  and  a 
moment  later  the  priest  enters  to  apprise 


280       THE   STORY   OF   DU  BARRY 

her  of  the  failure  of  her  appeal  and  to  hear 
her  last  confession. 

At  no  moment  during  the  play  does  the 
actress  make  a  more  profound  impression 
on  her  audience  than  in  that  in  which  she 
realizes  for  the  first  time  that  her  last  hope 
is  gone  and  that  she  must  die. 

Springing  forward  with  a  cry  that  is  sur- 
charged with  the  bitterest  anguish  and  de- 
spair, she  begins  the  pleadings  for  life  which 
do  not  cease  until  the  very  end.  But  the 
sentence  has  been  pronounced,  her  petition 
for  clemency  refused,  and  her  life  must 
come  to  an  end  with  to-morrow's  sun. 

But  it  is  the  last  scene  which,  more  than 
all  of  the  others,  leaves  its  indelible  mark 
on  the  memory.  And  this  one  is  almost 
completely  in  accord  with  the  happenings 
set  down  in  history.  In  only  one  particular 
has  Mr.  Belasco  made  use  of  his  license  as  a 
dramatist,  and  that  is  in  bringing  Cosse- 
Brissac  on  to  the  scene  for  a  final  word  of 
farewell  with  the  woman  whom  he  had  loved 
so  fondly.  The  reason  for  this  is  obvious, 
though,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  Cosse  had 
already  been  guillotined. 


DAVID   BELASCO. 


DREYFUS-LIKE   JUSTICE  281 

Surely  the  sternest  preacher  of  morality 
could  ask  no  more  convincing  portrayal  of 
the  ending  of  a  dissolute  life .  than  Mr. 
Belasco  has  given  us  in  this  awful  repre- 
sentation of  the  passage  of  the  once  pam- 
pered and  envied  Favorite  through  the  mob 
that  surges  about  the  cart  that  is  taking 
her  to  the  guillotine. 

It  is  midwinter  in  Paris,  and  the  curtain 
rises  on  a  scene  through  whose  darkness 
nothing  can  be  seen  but  the  flakes  of  fall- 
ing snow.  Almost  imperceptibly  the  night 
fades  before  the  cold  gray  light  of  early 
dawn,  until  there  comes  a  moment  when  it 
is  hard  to  realize  that  we  are  not  actually 
gazing  at  a  deserted  street  in  which  the 
snow  is  swiftly  and  silently  falling.  Little 
by  little  the  day  grows,  and  then  we  see 
that  this  deserted  street  is  the  rue  St. 
Honore,  and  that  the  house  directly  in 
front  of  us  is  the  shop  of  Madame  Labille, 
where  the  milliner's  apprentice,  Jeanette 
Vaubernier,  gained  some  of  her  earliest 
knowledge  of  the  life  in  which  she  played 
such  a  picturesque  and  wanton  part. 

The  door  of  the  shop  opens  and  Hor- 


282       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

tense,  the  forewoman,  who  still  carries  in 
her  heart  a  loving  remembrance  of  the 
pretty,  wilful  Jeanette  of  other  days,  peers 
down  the  street  through  the  falling  flakes. 
The  procession  is  on  its  way,  and  one  after 
another  the  windows  along  the  street  are 
opened  and  heads  thrust  out  to  peer  anx- 
iously in  the  direction  from  which  the 
tumbrel  bearing  the  condemned  is  ap- 
proaching, to  the  accompaniment  of  a 
hoarse  clamor  that  grows  in  volume  as  it 
draws  nearer. 

Soldiers  take  possession  of  the  street 
and  stand  ready  to  keep  back  the  mob  of 
men,  women  and  children  that  gather 
from  every  side,  filling  every  doorway, 
climbing  up  on  the  steps  of  houses,  and 
even  swarming  up  to  places  of  vantage  on 
the  statue  in  the  square. 

Now  comes  the  advance  guard  that  in 
those  days  accompanied  every  victim  of 
the  reign  of  terror  to  the  place  of  execu- 
tion. A  bevy  of  brazen-faced  young  girls, 
called  "  cart  swallows,"  appear  dancing 
round  the  cart  in  which  the  last  of  the 
royal  Favorites  is  taking  her  final  journey. 


On  the  Way  to  Execution. 


DREYFUS-LIKE   JUSTICE  285 

As  they  turn  the  corner,  the  mob  bursts 
into  hoarse  shouts  of  triumph,  and  surges 
against  the  restraining  lines  of  soldiers  in 
a  mad  attempt  to  forestall  the  execu- 
tioner's work. 

It  is  a  triumph  of  stage  management, 
this  mob,  but  which  one  of  us,  so  absorb- 
ing is  the  interest  in  the  play,  stops  to 
think  of  it  ?  Stage  mobs  there  have  been 
in  New  York  a  plenty,  but  never  one  like 
this. 

It  was  a  wonderful  mob,  organized  and 
directed  according  to  the  system  in  vogue 
in  the  Saxe-Meiningen  Company,  that 
roused  itself  under  the  spur  of  Marc 
Antony's  oratory  when  Ludwig  Barnay 
played  at  the  Thalia  Theatre  nearly 
twenty  years  ago.  There  was  another 
great  mob  in  "  Paul  Kauvar "  organized 
and  directed  by  Steele  Mackaye.  Very 
effective,  too,  was  the  work  of  Heinrich 
Couried's  mob  when  "  The  Weavers  "  was 
given  at  the  Irving  Place  Theatre.  There 
have  been  dozens  of  stage  mobs  that  could 
be  cited,  but  not  one  in  any  serious  drama 
that  was  not  black-browed  and  sullen  in 


286       THE   STORY   OF   DU   BARRY 

its  whole  attitude.  Here,  at  one  of  the 
most  tragic  moments  that  can  be  imagined, 
the  whole  scene  swarms  with  a  mob  which 
is  exultant  and  greedy  for  the  blood  that 
is  to  come  and  which  is  nevertheless  not 
sullen  but  sardonic.  It  is  a  mob  that 
taunts  its  victim  with  her  immoralities 
and  fills  the  whole  street  with  bursts  of 
hideous  laughter  at  the  mere  idea  of  this 
wretched  woman  ever  having  known  a 
love  that  was  pure  and  honest. 

There  are  a  score  of  different  well-con- 
ceived and  carefully  costumed  Parisian 
types  in  this  mob,  but  no  one  notices  them. 
The  entire  interest  of  the  audience  is  cen- 
tred in  the  jolting  two- wheeled  cart  which 
pauses  for  a  moment  on  its  way  to  the 
scaffold  in  the  Place  de  la  Revolution. 
The  cart  has  three  occupants,  —  the  exe- 
cutioner, red-capped  and  grim ;  Jeanette 
Du  Barry,  white  with  fear  ;  and  the  priest 
in  his  black  robe  who  remains  with  her  to 
the  end. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  such  abject, 
pitiful  terror  as  that  shown  by  this  wretched 
woman,  who  crouches  at  the  feet  of  her 


DREYFUS-LIKE   JUSTICE  287 

confessor,  her  beautiful  hair  cropped  close 
for  the  knife,  the  ashen  pallor  of  death 
already  in  her  face. 

"  Ha,  ha !  You  're  afraid  to  die  ! " 
screams  a  woman  in  the  mob. 

"  Yes,  I  know  I  'm  afraid  to  die,"  she 
responds  in  piteous  tones,  and  the  street 
echoes  with  shrill,  sardonic,  mirthless 
laughter. 

From  the  balcony  of  the  milliner's  shop, 
Hortense,  faithful  and  courageous,  throws 
a  bunch  of  violets  into  the  cart,  and  utters 
a  few  words  of  farewell.  The  mob  turns 
toward  her  with  the  fierce  remonstrance  of 
wild  beasts  threatened  with  the  loss  of 
their  prey. 

Cosse,  the  one  pure  love  of  her  life, 
presses  close  to  her  for  a  parting  word, 
while  the  mob  beats  against  the  line  of 
soldiery  and  curses  and  howls  till  the  priest 
with  uplifted  cross  commands  them,  in  the 
name  of  the  Lord,  to  allow  the  condemned 
woman  to  go  in  peace  to  her  death. 

"  It 's  too  bad,  Cosse,"  she  says  at  last, 
in  a  voice  low  and  despairing  and  which 
finds  its  way  into  every  heart  in  the  audi- 


288       THE   STORY  OF   DU   BARRY 

ence,  "  it 's  too  bad  we  never  went  into  the 
country  to  pick  those  violets."  The  driver 
cracks  his  whip,  the  wheels  turn,  and  again, 
with  blood-curdling  shouts,  the  crowd 
surges  around  the  cart  as  it  passes  on  to 
the  scaffold,  and  we  who  have  watched  the 
play  can  almost  see  the  knife  that  awaits 
her  coining,  the  same  knife  that  gleamed 
across  the  actress's  fancy  the  moment  she 
set  foot  on  the  stage. 


PRINTED  FOR  FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 
BY  THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS,  JOHN  WILSON 
AND  SON  (INC.),  CAMBRIDGE,  U.  S.  A. 


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